In the U.S. 49.7 Million Are Now Poor, and 80% of the Total Population Is Near Poverty

[hfojvt]

52. and yet

your income is probably higher than mine.

Being two paychecks away from poor does not really make you "near" poor. A person could make $200,000 a year, for example, and still be two paychecks away from poverty, and wouldn't it be absurd to call somebody making $200,000 a year "near poor"?

Think of it this way. Right now, you and I are alive. BUT we are only one serious accident, a lightning strike, a stray bullet, or a heart attack away from death. Still that fact does not make either of us dead (poor) or near death. Somebody who got shot or got in an accident and is in ICU or the operating room is "near death". We, in spite of the uncertainties of life, are not.

You don't stop being alive just because IF something happens you could be dead, any more than you stop being "non poor" because IF something happens you could be poor. Not even if those things DO happen to lots of people. Until they actually DO happen, you are on one side of the bridge.

Me, with my $13,000 income, I could lose my job tomorrow and probably still be okay. I'd have to cut some expenses, but I think I could make it.