poverty

We have a masonry company with good workers right here in Middletown. The city is not ADA compliant I know, but if we start listing out specific areas that help our special needs be able to get to the grocery or local park if there is one in their neighborhood then provide that list to the city we can start to make baby steps in the right direction. I suggest any left over material from commercial jobs be used to fix the curbs and sidewalks in many areas. I ride a bike now since my van broke down and just from my temporary home to Save A Lot I had to get off my bike a couple times and walk to avoid side walk curbs that were not ramps. If I can't ride a bike then I know those with special needs cannot get very far. Now when I rode in the Sherman area it was much better, but there are a boat load of places surrounding Sherman that need work.

I salute you,Darcy, I hope your post can encourage others.

Debate the causes of Middletown's poverty all you want, but you will not find the answer as it has already been given to you and you ignored it. Thank you squeemy (?).

Poverty is growing in the US and will continue to grow as we have a systemic political problem that looks hopeless in my opinion. As was stated earlier, Middletown is just ahead of the curve, more than likely due to it's proximity to I75. We had been in decline since the 60s when all the economic development had the lure of the interstate corridor pulling it to the I75 area away from Middletown proper and thus were already in decline high gear when the "destroy the middle class" project started.

The world Economy simply offered too much opportunity to the big money people of the World to pass up even if it meant that the middle class would take a hit. Unfortunately, as American Business has done of late, the long term consequences were ignored. When a Nation's economy exist with  70% of economic activity due to domestic consumer spending, how in the world can we ignore the the financial hit the middle class has taken and NOT expect that economic activity to wane? Additionally with a disproportional amount of  the profits now coming from the financial area, as was mentioned earlier, we have the event of "paper" profits verse concrete profits that are associated with manufacturing.

Can any of you educate me as to how things could be different given our current economic structure?   All the tax cuts in the World and even more  free trade than we have now are going to do nothing but make matters worst, yet that is all you hear out of Washington.

THAT is why Middletown has so much poverty.

 Also...be careful about how much you bash the poor as you may find yourself there faster than you ever expected. I know many people in just that position.

both good points