Social Inequality

Homework #2: Social Inequality

Many of the Americans living in poverty cannot afford decent meals, housing facilities and medical cover. While attempting the challenge as a restaurant attendant, I found myself struggling with moral decisions on issues relating to my child and the due bills. I made it through the month barely, but after foregoing bills. Through participating in this exercise, it is clear that it is easier to understand the harsh realities about poverty. Lack of affordable housing is the main cause of homelessness in America. Most of the people opt to live far away from work to reduce the cost of rent. In other situations, others are forced to share housing even when the situations of living with the roommate are challenging. Furthermore, the majority of Americans choose to do home improvement on their own this is because it is cheaper than hiring a plumber.

The majority of Americans cannot find enough food for their daily nutrition needs due to increased poverty. Most parents struggle to ensure that their children get enough food, due to a tight budget. For example, people go for cheap food, which are less nutritious, with more calories. From recent studies, there is increasing levels of obesity due to poor eating lifestyle (Couch et al., 403). Furthermore, many low-income earners opt out of the health insurance because they cannot afford, making it difficult for them to access good medications when ill. Increase in the unemployment rate is hard hitting college graduates, such that in 2010, approximately 11 percent of the graduates did not have the capacity to pay for their student loan. Furthermore, unemployment has also led to drug abuse to alleviate stress. In the effort to curb unemployment, policies have to be enacted to ensure that there is affordable health care access to all the people irrespective of their social class. For example, the Affordable Care Act means new insurance for many. In addition, policies need to be placed that warrants companies to improve payment for low-income earners.

Work cited

Couch, Kenneth, Timothy M. Smeeding, and Jane Waldfogel. “Fighting poverty: Attentive policy can make a huge difference.” Journal of Policy Analysis and Management 29.2 (2010): 401-407.