U.S. Poverty Rate Drops 1st Time Since 2000

Oh, wait, that's good news about the current administration, they don't konw how to handle that...

jamie, I'm sure they're too busy fretting over the fact that (despite the lower poverty rate) the percentage of Americans without health insurance is at a record high.

I think jamie may be a free-market kind of guy. If people with rising incomes don't have health insurance, it's their own fault, probably frittered their money away senselessly on food or housing.

nah, they donated it to the Clintons...see the thread from X that covers that...

Quotes from the NY Times report:

stats are what you make them, c'mon people you know that!

my household income went way down during this period when my son moved out with his full time pay, so now he is "in poverty" and you know that is a crock

another anectodal example: my dear mother is below the poverty level cause the stats don't cover social security and all the other transfer payments she receives

take all this with a grain of salt

ok if I read the numbers right the total number of people with healthcare is 86.7%, leaving people without healthcare at 13.3% Doesn't Michael Moore say it is closer to 44%?

95% of people polled believe that 88.7% of statistics are incorrect

No, he said 44 million people, not 44%.

hey what is 44 million divided by 310 million?

you might be surprised

And now it's 47 million.

Quick PR, what's 47 million divided by 310 million? You might be surprised....

The old joke is, of course, that the NYT would run the headline: "World to End - Women, Minorities Hardest Hit". In that light, I love the part about how the only "significant" increase was in white households.

On another point, shouldn't it be a good thing that there are fewer people being provided government healthcare? This reminds me of the commercials I hear advertising WIC benefits. I'm paying taxes to advertise welfare?

Yes, and I didn't even include the bit about the poverty rate dropping for Hispanics but remaining statistically unchanged for other racial/ethnic groups.


Yes - theoretically - if it meant that they were able to obtain healthcare through employment, or some other means. (But I take it that is not the case here.)

It says "statistically significant". That is a mathematical term with a specific meaning.

Yes, yes, confidence intervals and such. It's all very lovely.

Or that new Gibson Les Paul!

"Quick PR, what's 47 million divided by 310 million? You might be surprised.... "


ok 6.8% Really that doesnt seem as bad then...(I know I know anyone without health insurance has only this admin to blame)

How do you come up with 6.8%?

47/310 = .15

I am sure it is a mistake. ::sticking out tongue::

out of the 47 million without health insurance:

11 million are eligible for government programs like SCHIP but chose not to participate

15 million are illegal aliens

and another 12 million make more than $60 thousand a year, all this according to a BC/BS study

so that leaves what, less than 10 million; and we need universal health care for this number?

what person in America cannot receive health care when needed?

Sorry Becka, I was really tired and went the wrong way with it. I am a IT geek so I really only try to deal with ones and zeros...

The Blue Cross/Blue Shield study is interesting, in a "it's amazing what you can do with numbers and the right verb choices" sort of way.

11 million eligible for CHIP. Well, 'eligible for CHIP' means 'child under 18' (and there are income guidelines.) Darn those children for not enrolling themselves... . The most you can say is that 11 million eligible children are not enrolled in CHIP. It takes a certain philosophical bent to turn 'are not enrolled' into 'chose not to participate.'

Similarly, asserting that some folks have a particular income level and therefore could have health insurance assumes more facts than the study presents. Admittedly, they probably wasted their money on food and shelter instead of health insurance.

The person like my brother who was self employed, with a 2 kids to support, who had integrity and wasn't eligible for medical assitance because he wasn't a pregnant woman or a child, and couldn't find a doctor who would see him without insurance and ended up in the ER when his symptoms were so bad that it was too late to save his life.

Oh, no worries. lol