Poverty In The Glass Castle

For Business communication class we were given the assignment of choosing two websites that where we could analyze ethos and provide how each website appealed to the audience. The two web sites that were chosen for this group project are, “UNICEF” and “Feed the Children”. We chose these two websites since these are charitable websites with good moral, good will and practices which provide great ethos. There were several differences in design and structure between the two websites which will be described in the following paragraphs.

The book “The Other America”, written by Michael Harrington, describes poverty in America in the 1950s and 1960s, when America became one of the most affluent and advanced nations in the world. The book was written in 1962, and Harrington states that there were about 50,000,000 (about 25% of the total population) poor in America at that time. The author did extensive research with respect to the family income levels to derive the poverty numbers, and used his own observations and experiences to write this book. This book addresses the reasons for poverty, the nature of poverty, the culture of poverty, the blindness of Middle Class America with respect to poverty, and the responsibility of all Americans in addressing the issue of poverty in America.

Poverty is a main part of life for many people in the world, more importantly the United States. Jeanette Walls shows how big of a problem poverty is in her memoir “The Glass Castle”, with her stories of how she grew up and her family’s struggles. How her family was treated along with what the people living around them found important clearly shows their economical class. The problem of food scarcity, or not having the bare necessities are some of poverty’s main problems. In “The Glass Castle”, the issues of poverty are displayed through not having the basic necessities, not being able to provide for children, and how there is not always enough food to feed everyone in the family.

Overall, this paper is about how poverty is very prominent in our society, and we need to learn more about it. We need to increase aid to low- income families because they cannot support

This course included lessons in both written and oral communication to increase the understanding of student diversity. I participated in discussions on the issues of diversity that affect student learning from diverse groups. With the use of Ruby Payne’s book, A Framework for Understanding Poverty and The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls, I examined and reflected on the ethnic and economic diversity in schools and students.

The United States defines poverty for a family of four as being less than $16,036 per year, or $4,009 per person (Leone 12). People find themselves under this line for an innumerable amount of reasons. Some of these causes are under one's control and others are greater factors beyond an individual's power. Each family or individual person has unique and separate reasons for living in a state poverty. There is no way to try and define them all. Focusing in, three main topics arise that encompass the most predominant reasons for a person to fall into poverty. Education, family life and influence, along with the business cycle may work individually or together to cause poverty. These three leading

For practically every family, then, the ingredients of poverty are part financial and part psychological, part personal and part societal, part past and part present. Every problem magnifies the impact of others, and all are so tightly interlocked that one reversal can produce a chain reaction with results far distant from the original cause. A run-down apartment can exacerbate a child's asthma, which leads to a call for an ambulance, which generates a medical bill that cannot be paid, which ruins a credit record, which hikes the interest rate on an auto loan, which forces the purchase of an unreliable used car, which jeopardizes a mother's punctuality at work, which limits her promotions and earning capacity, which confines her to poor housing.

The first reason Rex is an outsider is because of his life at home when he was a child. When the family visits his family, Erma is shown to be a very stern, hard person who does not seem to be a fan of having fun. For example, when the children are in the basement laughing, they hear a loud noise which their mother says it their grandmother Erma, explaining, "She asked that you kids don't laugh while you're in her house," (132). His family’s lack of compassion most likely led to him not being close to people, and also led to another problem of Rex’s: his drinking. Rex’s drinking problems isolate both him and his family, as Jeannette explained, “Other kids wanted to fight us … because Dad was a drunk” (164). Lastly, Rex is always on the run

In the United States, there are about more than forty-six million people living in impoverished conditions today. Poverty is a major conflict issue in this country amongst people who are part of the lower class because American families always had a hard time making ends meet, even before the Great Recession began. Living in poverty puts them at a disadvantage because they have to choose between necessitates like health care, child care, and food in order to help themselves and their family members. Though many reforms had been made to help cope with those who are living in poverty, it has been keeping many from being able to climb the social class ladder because the “War on Poverty” has not been

In order to more clearly understand the severity of poverty in our nation, we must first look back to the source of the issue. With the start of The Great Depression in the 1920s, economic downturn was at it’s worst. After the Stock Market Crash of 1929, millions of investors on Wall Street were uprooted. This caused consumer spending to drastically decline over the next several years. With this decrease in consumer spending, nearly 15 million Americans were laid off and half of the country’s banks failed. President

About a decade ago my mother, sisters, and I had lived alone in a small apartment. Our meals consisted of frozen beans, rice, and occasional food given to us by our elderly neighbor, Brenda Gibson. Mrs.Gibson was an extraordinary woman who’d babysit my sisters and I while our mother worked the late night shifts at the local senior center. My mother had no choice, her regular shifts could only cover one-fourth of the bills, and because she spent her days working she never had time to spend with her growing daughters. I did not know it at the time, but my family was being mangled by the ice cold fingers of poverty, digging itself deep into our bones, and trying to suck out our happiness, a scene lived by many other families in our neighborhood. Although my family made it out alright, a question remains regarding the rest of America and the future of it’s struggling families. What are the characteristics of children experiencing poverty in America and how do their characteristics affect and influence their life choices? Not only was this question influenced by my own experience but also by “A Place at the Table,” a documentary directed by Kristi Jacobson and Lori Silverbush, explaining and showing the connection between poverty and the economy.

Isabel V. Sawhill wrote an article in 2008 titled “Poverty in the United States”. She talks about how poverty

Poverty effects us all in society money can cause all different types of types of stress. Some of the subjects I will be going over is how mental illness can be a contributing factor to poverty, drug addictions and the solutions I believe would assist with these illnesses, and the employment opportunities that are effected by addictions and mental disorders. Sometimes this stress can lead to a mental disorder or in some cases addictions depending on how one manages financial stress. Stress can lead to mental disorders 30 to 40 percent of homeless people suffer from a mental illness. “Sociological research from as far back as the 1030`s has found that mental health of the lower class is worse than that of the higher class”(Faris and Dunham 1939; Srole et al 2011). Mental health plays a large part of everyday life for those who live in poverty with a mental disorder it is extremely difficult to function when they do not have the medications need to function in society. Part of this issue is not having a stable income to afford medications and treatment. Once an individual is homeless and living in poverty the employers make it close to impossible for them to find a job this can be due to their mental illness or the fact they do not have the qualifications most employers requir. This can be extremely discouraging for those that want to make money to afford shelter and food. Mental illness is dangerous when it is not treated. Those who suffer from a

Poverty exists for many reasons: the organization of the U.S economic system, high divorce rates, single parent families, racism, discrimination, disability, poor education, mental illness and individual failures. Those who live in poverty or in poor neighborhoods are at a much higher risk of psychological distress which can be caused by higher rates of unemployment, financial burdens, homelessness, substance abuse, and criminal activity. Many who live in poverty become vulnerable to poor physical and mental health, they are often victimized by society and their ability to access health care is significantly restricted. Many who are psychologically impaired face barriers in furthering their education and in finding employment as well.

This review is formulated with scholarly sources and references based off of poverty in America. This disclosure is approached with a value free sociological approach, and it will give insight on the social causes of poverty and the effects it has on America. Poverty is a very controversial topic. Many will assume that people living in poverty are lazy, made bad life decisions, or that they are solely the reason for their predicament however, people living in poverty would argue that their are deeper issues for it. Poverty will be deeply explained and researched from both perspectives