>>>Actually I did respond to that. The whole point is that if you have a full time job, then you SHOULD be able to afford to support yourself and a child. That is not the case anymore in the USA if you're on minimum wage. Despite what you might think - in today's world, you're not going to make it on your own earning $800 a month with a kid to support. And even if you did mange to find a way to make it week to week or month to month - you're sure as hell never going to get anything out of life or own anything..like ummm..a house for example.
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>Your point a being able to support yourself and a child is well taken.
>That was possible when I was young. My mother, a young widow, supported two sons on her own while working at low paying jobs and I saw many other instances like ours.
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>You stray a bit however, with your point about having a house.
>That would have been out of the question for my mother and for most of my family members.
>It was a big deal when my mother had her first phone installed.
>After my career got going I was the first person in my family (all generations) to own a house. I also owned the first car, the first color TV, the first dishwasher, clothes dryer, etc, etc.
>My point is that somehow my mother got along without all those things and provided food and a roof for my brother and me while we hustled our way through college.
>She walked to church and to the stores and took the bus to and from work.
>We NEVER ate in a restaurant- no problem with junk food or sodas in our house- we couldn't afford it.
>I see low income families eating at McDonalds and the kids are walking around with Ipod's and Iphones. That's nonsense.

Yes this all makes sense. However keep in mind that your mother did all these things years ago - when it was actually possible to do so. I doubt things would be as easy today to pull that off. As for seeing poor people eat at McDonalds - well there are lots of reasons for that. First of all, compared to eating food that is actually healthy, it's cheaper - and what is going to be in the poor neighborhoods? convenience stores, fast food places, pawn shops, payday loan shops, and gold & silver brokers. And these days a kid probably needs a iphone or tablet computer of some kind just as much asI needed a calculator years ago when I was a kid.
The disparity between the rich and the poor is wider now in the USA than it was right before the great depression. The disparity between blacks and whites is currently worse than it EVER was during Africa's apartheid. The republican party has shown repeatedly that they have zero interest in fixing any of this and actually seem to adopt polices that make it worse. Toss the koch brothers in the mix and...well... like I been saying - a few fat rich white guys running the show and stacking the deck against everyone else.