“I'm not concerned about the very poor, we have a safety net there, if we need to repair, I'll fix it. I'm not concerned about the very rich, they're doing just fine. I'm concerned about the very heart of America, the 90-95 percent of Americans who are struggling, and I'll continue to take that message across the country.” IfsNeedsHeartCountryAmericaValuesPoorStruggleRichFineMessagesPercentConcernedSafetyConservativeSafety NetConservative Values Author:Mitt Romney
“The I-95 bridges were built in the early 1960s and are now more than 50 years old. The same vintage as the I-35 bridge that collapsed in Minnesota back in 2007, killing 13 people and injuring 145. The antiquated Skagit River Bridge in Washington state that collapsed last May after a truck hit one of the trusses was even older. And it's not just bridges. According to the American Society of Civil Engineers, 32 percent of the major roads in America are now in poor condition and in need of major repairs.” PeopleNeedsYearsMayStatesLastsAmericaPoorConditionsMajorsPercentBuiltRiversKillingBridgesEngineersTruck1960sVintageAmerican SocietyMinnesotaCivil EngineerWashington State Author:Ed Rendell
“A decade ago, critics suggested biotech crops would not be valuable in the developing world. Now 90 percent of farmers who benefit are resource-poor farmers in developing countries. These helped alleviate 7.7 million subsistence farmers in China, India, South Africa, the Philippines from abject poverty.” WorldCountryPoorPovertyMillionsBenefitsPercentResourcesIndiaSouthCriticsChinaValuableDecadesDevelopingFarmersSouth AfricaCropsPhilippinesAlleviateDeveloping CountriesSubsistenceBiotech Author:Clive James
“In our society competitive capitalism has put family life and working life on a collision course.In Canada statistics show that over 70 percent of the burden of caring for children, the aged, the disabled and the sick falls on women most of whom receive no pay for these very essential tasks.Normally speaking, it may be said that the forces of capitalism, if left unchecked, tend to make the rich richer and the poor poorer and thus increase the gap between them.” IfsMayChildrenSaidShowsFallCoursesLeftForcePoorPayRichEssentialsPercentCapitalismTasksSickIncreaseBurdenCaringCanadaOur SocietyStatisticsGapsFamily LifeDisabledCollisionChild CareWorking Life Author:Jawaharlal Nehru
“The whole financial structure of Wall Street seems to rise or fall on the mere fact that the Federal Reserve Bank raises or lowers the amount of interest. Any business that can't survive a one percent change must be skating on thin ice. Why even the poor farmer took a raise of another ten percent just to get a loan from the bank, and nobody from the government paid any attention. But you let Wall Street have a nightmare and the whole country has to help to get them back into bed again.” CountryWholeFactsHelpingSeemsGovernmentFallInterestPoorAttentionStreetsWallAmountBedTenPercentEconomicsPaidRaisesStructureMereFinancialIceNightmareFarmersReservesLoanSkatingFederal ReserveSkating On Thin Ice Author:Will Rogers
“Ninety percent of our lives is governed by emotion. Our brains merely register and act upon what is telegraphed to them by our bodily experience. Intellect is to emotion as our clothes are to our bodies; we could not very well have civilized life without clothes, but we would be in a poor way if we had only clothes without bodies.” IfsWayWellsBodyWould BeLife IsPoorEmotionBrainOur LivesClothesPercentIntellectCivilizedNinetyRegister Author:Alfred North Whitehead
“In spite of the poor economy, almost 70 percent of Americans occasionally splurge on luxury items -- like a blanket on a plane, or a peanut.” PoorEconomyPercentLuxuryPlanesSpiteItemsBlanketPeanutsLuxury Items Author:Jay Leno
“Children, together with women, constitute 90 percent of all refugee populations on the planet as well as the vast majority of those living in absolute poverty: the 'feminization of poverty' means that children are poor, too, since most parenting is done by mothers.” WellsMeanChildrenDoneTogetherMotherPoorPovertyPlanetsPercentAbsolutesMajorityPopulationRefugee Book:Saturday's Child: A Memoir Source: Saturday's Child: A Memoir
“I should say many things. Mexico has been one of the losers of the 20th century. We tried many different alternatives to development and unfortunately we have 40 percent of the population poor; we have a per capita income that is extremely low.” ShouldHas BeensDifferentPoorCenturyDevelopmentLowsPercentPopulationIncomeAlternativesLoserMexico20th Century Author:Vicente Fox
“The general systems of money management today require people to pretend to do something they can't do and like something they don't. It's a funny business because on a net basis, the whole investment management business together gives no value added to all buyers combined. That's the way it has to work. Mutual funds charge two percent per year and then brokers switch people between funds, costing another three to four percentage points. The poor guy in the general public is getting a terrible product from the professionals.” PeopleWayGivingYearsTwoWholeTodayTogetherGuyValuesThreePoorFourProductsTerriblePercentBasesManagementInvestmentInvestingFundMutualPercentagesLike SomethingBuyersMoney ManagementGeneral PublicFunny BusinessBrokersMutual FundInvestment Management Author:John C. Bogle
“Young women don't want to be called feminists because it's not sexy and ah they think that their mothers and grandmothers have achieved everything they want. They don't know how poor women live, how women in rural places live, how 80 percent of women in the world are the poorest of the poor, how still there are 27 million slaves, and most of them women and girls.” ThinkingKnowsWorldWantStillsYoungMotherGirlPoorMillionsKnow HowPercentSlaveFeministSexyGrandmotherYoung WomenPoorestMother And Grandmother Author:Isabel Allende
“Charity is to unburden you from your guilt, so you say, `I am doing something: I going to open a hospital, going to open a college. I give money to this charity fund, to that trust....` You feel a little happier. The world has lived in poverty, the world has lived in scarcity, ninety-nine percent of people have lived a poor life, almost starving and dying, and only one percent of people have lived with richness, with money - they have always felt guilty. To help them, the religions developed the idea of charity. It is to rid them of their guilt.” PeopleWorldGivingFeelsLittlesIdeasHelpingFeltPoorPovertyDyingCollegePercentGuiltCharityNineGuiltyFundHospitalsNinetyStarvingRichnessScarcityNinety NinePoor Life Author:Rajneesh
“If one is talking to a finance minister of a poor country, moral arguments tend not to get very far. But if you can argue that their country is going to grow 2 percent faster per year if they can just harness the power of the female half of the population more effectively, that is an argument they consider.” IfsYearsCountryGrowsPoorHalfTalkingMoralPercentFemaleArgumentPopulationArguingFinanceFasterMinistersHarnessPoor Countries Author:Nicholas D. Kristof
“Ninety-seven percent of the CEOs of the Fortune 500 are white men, and what they do radiates all the way down into poor areas and cities around our country. Like predatory lending and misallocation of municipal services. These guys get municipal service, poor areas don't. So they run the economy into the ground, and who suffers the most? The poor pay more and they die earlier.” MenWayCountryRunningGuySufferingDiesWhitePoorPayCitiesEconomyPercentAreasFortuneSevenOur CountryCeoWhite ManNinetyLendingPredatory Author:Ralph Nader
“24.9 percent of American children live in poverty, while the proportions in Germany, France and Italy are 8.6, 7.4 and 10.5 percent. And once born on the wrong side of the tracks, Americans are more likely to stay there than their counterparts in Europe. Those born to better-off families are more likely to stay better off. America is developing an aristocracy of the rich and a serfdom of the poor - the inevitable result of a twenty-year erosion of its social contract.” YearsChildrenAmericaSocialSidesBornPoorResultsPovertyRichPercentEuropeTwentiesTrackDevelopingFranceInevitableGermanyProportionContractsBetter OffAristocracyCounterpartsErosionSocial Contract Author:Will Hutton
“Muqtada leads the only real mass movement in Iraq. It's a mass movement of the Shia, who are 60 percent of the population, and of poor Shia - and most Shia are poor. Otherwise the place is full of sort of self-declared leaders, many of whom spend most of their time outside Iraq.” RealSelfPoorLeaderMovementMassPercentIraqPopulationShia Author:Patrick Cockburn
“I can't help but react to the painful realities of the two-tiered society we live in, where the signs of poverty and inequity are everywhere. Almost twenty five percent of our children live at or below the poverty line. We expect the no-option life cycle of the poor to be interrupted by the weak social safety net and then wonder why building more jails doesn't solve the problems.” ChildrenI CanTwoHelpingProblemRealitySocialLinesPoorWonderPovertyFiveBuildingPercentWeakTwentiesOur ChildrenSafetyPainfulSolveCyclesJailTwenty FiveInterruptedSafety Net Author:Peter Yarrow
“The death of American liberalism as a significant moral force can be traced to the point in when President Bill Clinton signed legislation that effectively ended the main federal anti-poverty program and turned the fate of welfare recipients, 70 percent of whom were children, over to the tender mercies of the states. With a stroke of the pen, Clinton eliminated what remained of New Deal-era compassion for the poor and codified into law the "tough love" callousness that his Republican allies in the Congress, led by Newt Gingrich, had long embraced.” ChildrenLongStatesLawForcePresidentPoorDealsCompassionMoralPovertyFateRepublicanPercentToughProgramMercyBillsClintonCongressSignificantErasWelfareLiberalismPensAlliesLegislationStrokesNewtsNew DealTough LoveCallousnessPresident Bill ClintonTender MerciesWelfare Recipients Author:Robert Scheer
“I don't think child care is ever going to be much of a federal effort. Just like education. Six or 7 percent - that's all I want from the government. Pay that piece of it for poor or developmentally disabled children.” ThinkingWantChildrenGovernmentCarePoorEffortPayPiecesSixPercentDisabledChild CareDisabled Children Author:Edward Zigler
“A poor child who receives high-quality early childhood development is 40 percent less likely to need special education, twice as likely to attend college and dramatically more likely to survive childhood.” NeedsChildrenPoorQualityChildhoodSpecialCollegeDevelopmentPercentHigh QualityEarly ChildhoodPoor ChildrenSpecial Education Author:Shakira
“The Bank and the media continue to propagate the story that the global elite wishes to be told: that the number of poor has declined by 24 percent in those 15 years [1990-2005].” YearsStoriesWishPoorNumbersMediaPercentElites Author:Thomas Pogge
“A majority, perhaps as many as 75 percent, of abortion clinics are in areas with high minority populations. Abortion apologists will say this is because they want to serve the poor. You don't serve the poor, however, by taking their money to terminate their children.” WantChildrenPoorPercentAreasMajorityPopulationAbortionMinoritiesClinic Author:Alveda King
“I do care about not 99 percent or 95 percent. I care about the very rich and the very poor. I care about 100 percent of America.” CareAmericaPoorRichPercentI CareI Do Care Author:Rick Santorum
“What if we gave fifty percent of our discretionary budget to the world’s poor and then counted on the moral power of that action to protect us?” IfsWorldActionPoorMoralProtectPercentBudgetsFiftyWhat If Author:Anne Lamott
“When I got to college, the fake ID thing wasn't that important, since pretty much everyone could get away with drinking in New Orleans. But the drugs, well, that was a different story altogether, because drugs are every bit as illegal in New Orleans as anywhere else--at least, if you're black and poor, and have the misfortune of doing your drugs somewhere other than the dorms at Tulane University. But if you are lucky enough to be living at Tulane, which is a pretty white place, especially contrasted with the city where it's located, which is 65 percent black, then you are absolutely set.” IfsWellsImportantDifferentEnoughStoriesBitsBlackWhitePoorCitiesCollegeDrugLuckyPercentDrinkingUniversityFakeGet AwayIllegalMisfortunesNew OrleansDorms Author:Tim Wise