Media Assignment due date changes

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Media Assignment due date changes 3Due
4/6 4Due 4/18 5Still Due 4/27 Assignment
due Thursday, 3/16 From Part 4, answer questions
1, 5, and 6 from pages 315-316. Your responses
should span a total of at least two full pages.
Notice 6 requires more information than either
1 or 5.
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Part 5Poverty, Inequality, and Structural
Violence 20 of the population in the developed
nations consume 86 of the worlds goods. --1998
Human Development Report, UN Development
Programme A mere 12 of the worlds population
uses 85 of its water, and these 12 do not live
in the Third World. --Maude Barlow, National
Chairperson, Council of Canadians
As of 2000, nearly half the worlds population
lived on less than 2 per day. As of 1997, the
wealthiest 20 of the worlds countries had 74
times as much wealth as the poorest 20 (318).
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5.1Inequality in the Global Village, Jan
Knippers Black Are the recent findings of
economic progress telling the whole story?
During the 1980s, 70 percent of the worlds
ninety-five least developed countries suffered
overall economic decline in the 1980s (324),
thirty six of the poorest being forced to slash
education and health budgets by 25 and 50
percent, respectively. While the World Bank
showed a decline between 1987 and 1993 from 34
to 32 of people in developing countries living
in poverty, estimates actually show an increase
in the number of poverty stricken people by
100,000 millionfrom 1.2 billion to 1.3 billion
total. Also, Advances in some areas have come
at the expense of decline in others (325).
While the 1990s have been hailed as largely
representing an economic boom, the boom in the US
commonly came at the expense of the workers, who
made less in real wages in 1997 than they had in
1989. --But on an aggregate measure, things
looked good
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Between 1990 and 1993, Zambia spent thirty-five
times as much on debt payment as it did on
education (328) 17 million die each year in
developing countries of curable infections and
parasitic diseases HIV/AIDS afflicts 23 million
per year. In the US, over 47 million lack
health insurance. This translates to 800 million
worldwide. The American Association of State
Colleges and Universities reports a five
hundred-dollar-per-student decline between 1980
and 1995 in state appropriations for public
universities and colleges, largely a result of
increased state costs for prisons and health
care (329) --the US currently incarcerates over
2 million of its citizens
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5.2Poverty and Inequality in the Global
Economy, Michael D. Yates Are we really
slouching toward utopia through capitalism?
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What are the trends in poverty?
http//www.census.gov/prod/2005pubs/p60-229.pdf
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Who are the poor? Percentage of population
living in poverty12.7 (37 million) Percentage
of population under 18 living in poverty17.8
(13 million) Percentage of Asians in
poverty9.8 (1.2 million) Percentage of
non-Hispanic whites in poverty8.6 (16.9
million) Percentage of blacks in poverty24.7
(9 million) Percentage of Hispanics in
poverty21.9 (9.1 million) Percentage of
population without health insurance15.7 --curre
ntly at 45.8 million, up from 45 million in
2003 National unemployment rate5 (7.4
million, as of July 2005) http//www.epi.org/conte
nt.cfm/webfeatures_econindicators_jobspict_2005080
5 Note According to the Bureau of Labor
Statistics (www.bls.gov), only those individuals
who are over 16 and who 1) do not currently have
a job, 2) have actively sought work in the past
four weeks, and 3) are able to work are included
in the unemployed numbers.
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Poverty Thresholds, 2004 http//www.census.gov/Pre
ss-Release/www/releases/archives/income_wealth/005
647.html Four people 19,307 Three
people 15,067 Two people 12,334 One person
9,645
Federal Minimum Wage
5.15 per hour
So a single mother of one child can work full
time (40 hours per week, 52 weeks per year) while
getting paid 5.50 per hour but only make
11,440 per year
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As of 2003 in the United States.
Top 10 has 71 of the Net Wealth
(Of the 71, the top 1 holds 47.3 of the Net
Wealth)
The Bottom 90 has the other 29
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Percentage of Population
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The World Bank examines those individuals who
subsist on just over 1 per day, and through
studies using this measurement, the World Bank
has determined that world poverty declined over
the 1990s. --But the World Bank uses and index
of prices of all things in a poor country, not
necessarily the prices of things that poor people
buy. --these prices rarely change in
significant ways
In India, roughly a third of the population lives
in dire poverty. In Calcutta, an estimated
250,000 children sleep on the streets each night
(334). The income of the richest 25 million
Americans is the equivalent of nearly 2 billion
of the worlds poorest persons (2 billion is 80
times 25 million) (335).
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The Gross Domestic Product (GDP) per capita as a
measurement of wealth
Notice that those countries with higher GDPs
represent those countries in which capitalism
arose earlier, while the poorest countries are
those countries that were largely colonized.
But if we look at nonmoney measures of living
conditions Life expectancy for
women US80 Switzerland82 Afghanistan46
Sierra Leone39 Infant mortality rates per 1,000
births Norway3.98 Ethiopia100
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Much of this inequality is directly tied to the
relative power of the workers to the owners
(337). It is often seen that more equality
exists within countries where the power
differential between these two groups is smaller
rather than larger. It is no accident that
the United States has both the weakest labor
movement and the most unequal income of any rich
country (337). Great and growing inequality
saps the political power of those at the bottom,
making it more likely that the social welfare
programs which help to alleviate the harmful
consequences of poverty will be gutted, while at
the same time making it more likely that policies
which further favor the rich will be put in
place (333) --How might welfare programs be a
reflection of this? What, then, is the
free-market that capitalists praise? Free
for whom? Why and how?
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5.3Is World Poverty Falling? Angus
Deaton Poverty in India
Over ¼ of the worlds poor lives in India. A huge
change or no change? Tweak with the instrument
and of course youll find a difference Does
measuring changes in poverty by changes in
consumption raise issues?