Most people have an idea of what it means to be poor. We think of conditions like hunger, homelessness, preventable diseases, unemployment, and illiteracy as elements of poverty. Those and other issues will be covered later in this book. However, from a social and economic standpoint, poverty is a complex topic that can be difficult to describe in objective terms. Most governments and social servi…
Income greatly influences where people live, what they eat, how they dress, what they drive, and what schools their children can attend. How much money and income they have is usually determined by their occupation, which is often directly related to their level of education. Racial and ethnic backgrounds can play a big role in all these factors. …
Homelessness is a complex social problem. According to the National Coalition for the Homeless in "How Many People Experience Homelessness?" (http://www.nationalhomeless.org/numbers.html, September 2002), one-half to three-quarters of a million people lack a place to sleep on any given night in the United States, and 3.5 million will be homeless at some time during the year. Social r…
Broad national assessments of homelessness were undertaken by several agencies and organizations during the 1980s and mid-1990s, including A Report to the Secretary on the Homeless and Emergency Shelters (Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, 1984), America's Homeless: Numbers, Characteristics, and Programs that Serve Them (Martha Burt and Barbara Cohen, Washington, DC: Urban Institute, 1989), and Homelessness: Programs and the People They Serve, Findings of th…
There is an undeniable connection between homelessness and poverty. People in poverty live from day to day with little or no safety net for times when unforeseen expenses arise. If a family's resources are very small, expenditures on such necessities as food, shelter, or health care have to be carefully decided and sometimes sacrificed. Should one spend money on food, a visit to the doctor, buying necessary medicines, or paying the rent? In 2005 a full-time job paying minimum wage for for…
A home was at one time defined as a place where a family resided, but as American society changed, so did the definition of home. A home is now considered a place where one or more people live together, a private place to which they have legal right and where strangers may be excluded. It is the place where people keep their belongings and where they feel safe from the outside world. For housing t…
Homelessness is widespread, and many people expect the government to step in to solve such a large-scale problem. What should the role of the government be in combating homelessness? Some people believe it is the duty of the government to take care of all citizens in times of need. Others point out that government help has often been misdirected or inadequate; in some instances, it has even added …
The process of renewal and rebuilding that accompanies an influx of middle-class or affluent people into deteriorating areas is called gentrification. It typically displaces earlier—and usually poorer—residents, and often destroys ethnic communities (Tom Wetzel, "What Is Gentrification?" 2004, http://www.uncanny.net/~wetzel/gentry.htm). While gentrification has positive…
Underdeveloped countries are at the very bottom of the global economy, with widespread extreme poverty and dire living conditions. They usually have little or no infrastructure or reliable health care and other social services. Many have experienced long-term political unrest in the form of civil war or armed conflict with other nations, or have been subject to unstable governments, dictatorships,…
The demographic profiles of non-Hispanic African-Americans, Hispanics, Asian-Americans, Pacific Islanders, Native Americans, and Alaska Natives differ considerably from those of the nonminority population. Because a high percentage of minorities live in urban areas, they are exposed to a greater number of environmental hazards, including pollution, traffic hazards, substandard and/or overcrowded h…
Health problems are recognized as both causes and effects of homelessness. For example, a health problem that prevents an impoverished person from working can result in a loss of income that leads to homelessness. For those living on the streets, lack of adequate shelter and proper facilities for maintaining personal hygiene can exacerbate illness. Alcoholism, mental illnesses, diabetes, and depression become visible and more pronounced in homeless people. Other serious illnesses (tuberculosis […
An emerging economy is one that is moving from developing to developed (or industrial),while a transition economy is one evolving from a planned economy (meaning one controlled by the government, as in the former Soviet bloc countries) to a free market economy like those in North America and Europe. A country may be both emerging and transitional. Countries undergoing these economic shifts experie…
Developing countries are those with incomes (in terms of gross domestic product, or GDP) that fall between the least developed countries and the industrialized nations. Most countries in the world can be described as "developing": neither hopelessly poor nor hopefully rich. These countries have segments of deep, absolute poverty and instances of great wealth in their populations, but…
Although the majority of the world's poor live in underdeveloped and developing countries, a fair number also live in the developed world—some in the wealthiest countries on earth. The economic gap between rich and poor nations has been widening since the 1980s, but the gap between rich and poor within developed countries has also been growing, as it has in transition economies. …
The Gallup Organization takes polls regularly to determine public opinion on discrimination, affirmative action, civil rights, and the progress that has been made by minorities in U.S. society. Polls consistently reveal differences in the way various groups perceive many issues and in their respective levels of satisfaction. …
This chapter covers the impact of immigration and related legislation from the founding of the first American colonies through the 1970s. Immigration from the 1980s to the present follows in Chapter 2. Information for these two chapters was drawn from a variety of resources, but in particular the U.S. Census Bureau; the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, Bureau of Citizenship and Immigration; t…
In "Immigration: Shaping and Reshaping America" (Population Bulletin 58, no. 2, June 2003), Philip Martin and Elizabeth Midgley point out that before the 1980s, U.S. immigration laws might have changed once in a generation, but the quickening pace of global change since 1980 brought major new immigration legislation in 1986, 1990, and 1996. The September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks l…
To understand the scope of the immigration issue in the United States, it is important to know the number of immigrants in the country, where they came from, why they came, and why some did not get to stay. Because immigrant statistics have been the basis for legislation as well as the funding of projects, information about immigrants' ages, skills, ability to work, and location of settleme…
Every year millions of people around the world are displaced by war, famine, civil unrest, and political unrest. Others are forced to flee their countries in order escape the risk of death and torture at the hands of persecutors. Generally, refugees are people who have been persecuted in their homeland, or have a well-founded fear of persecution there, on account of race, religion, nationality, me…
Illegal aliens are also known as illegal immigrants, illegal migrants, unauthorized migrants, undocumented immigrants, undocumented residents, and undocumented aliens. People often assume that the term illegal aliens refers specifically to Mexicans who have crossed the U.S.–Mexico border to work illegally in the United States. Although Mexicans may account for a number of the unauthorized entrants to the United States, illegal aliens can come from anywhere in the world.…
Virtually all groups that study poverty—from international organizations like the United Nations and the World Bank to small local charities—agree that the most effective way to reduce it is to improve the social, economic, and political situation of women and, by extension, children. Women's levels of health, education, and security reflect those of their families. When a mot…
Immigration is a hotly contested issue. Immigration supporters contend that immigrants contribute considerable sums of money to the public coffers and that, in an aging society, immigration is the only hope for a secure economic future. Immigration opponents argue that immigrants cost taxpayers far more than they contribute. George J. Borjas, an immigrant who left Cuba at age twelve and became a professor of public policy at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University, conclud…
In a series of articles published in late 2003, S. Lynne Walker chronicled the reopening of a large meat-packing company in Beardstown, Illinois, a town of 7,000 people ("Beardstown: Reflection of a Changing America," State Journal-Register, November 9–November 12, 2003). The revived industry brought not only jobs for local residents but an influx of immigrants, mostly from Mexico. Suddenly the local school was faced with students who did not speak English and a Catholic chu…
… I'm pleased to be with you this evening to talk about the anti-immigrant movement in America.… And why I believe this movement endangers the single most important reason for American greatness, namely, the renewal, reformation and reawakening that's provided by the continuous flow of immigrants who are seeking to create better lives for themselves and their families … and who succeed in doing so.…
Mr. Chairman, the problem of illegal immigration has reached historic proportions. Past attempts by Congress to reform immigration laws have provided nothing more than greater incentives and promised benefits for illegal aliens. The result is the present system which actually encourages immigrants to come to America illegally.…
Conditions in the environment that have a negative impact on the health and well-being of a population are known as environmental hazards. These can be natural events, such as an overabundance of insects that destroys crops; a weather pattern that causes a drought or flood; or a sudden, violent disaster such as an earthquake or volcanic eruption. Environmental hazards can also be human-caused prob…
The populations of countries engaged in conflict or warfare almost always experience some degree of economic hardship. During World War II (1939–45) much of Europe was reduced to near starvation, and even the United States—which saw no military action on its own soil—imposed strict rationing of goods on its citizens. This is because during times of war financial resources that…
The U.S. Bureau of the Census reported in Census 2000 that the U.S. population totaled 281.4 million people. (See Table 1.1.) Of that number, 69.1 percent identified themselves as white alone. The other 30.9 percent were members of one or more minority racial or ethnic groups. Although women are a majority of the nation's population (143.4 million women versus 138.1 million men according to Census 2000), women are often considered a "minority" in social issues. In this publi…
Regardless of their composition, families are generally regarded as a cornerstone of society. For many years, particularly when the United States was primarily an agricultural society, extended families—multiple generations living in the same household—were considered typical. As the culture became more urban and mobile, nuclear families—two parents and their children—b…
How effective has the international community been in combating global poverty throughout and since the twentieth century? The answers—for there are many—are varied and surprising. Some experts estimate that society is well on its way to achieving the United Nations' Millennium Development Goals, which, among other things, strive to cut extreme poverty rates in half by the yea…
Minorities and ethnic groups have always been an important part of the American labor force. In many instances, groups were allowed, or even encouraged, to immigrate to the United States to fill specific labor needs. Perhaps the most obvious example is the involuntary immigration of Africans, who provided slave labor for southern plantations as early as the seventeenth century. Later, Asians and Hispanics were sought to mine resources, farm land, and build railroads.…
Few noticeable changes have occurred in the occupational situations of African-Americans since the 1990s. In 2002 African-Americans accounted for 10.9 percent of the civilian labor force age sixteen and over. Of the entire employed population of African Americans, 22.7 percent held managerial and professional positions, compared to 31.9 percent of employed white Americans. Only 26.3 percent of all employed African-American women and 18.6 percent of African-American men were managers and professi…
Income greatly influences where people live, what they eat, how they dress, what they drive, and what schools their children can attend. How much money and income they have is usually determined by their occupation, which is often directly related to their level of education. Racial and ethnic backgrounds can play a big role in all these factors. In the years prior to and including 1973, the pover…
Minority groups face particular health-care challenges in addition to those of the general population. The Office of Minority Health was created in 1985 to advocate culturally and linguistically competent services and prevention efforts for minority communities. Among their main areas of concern: …
In 2000 approximately forty-seven million public school students were enrolled in kindergarten through twelfth grade in the United States. According to The Condition of Education, 2002 (Washington, DC: National Center for Education Statistics, 2003), approximately 39 percent of these students belonged to a minority group. Hispanics (16.6 percent) and African-Americans (16.6 percent) accounted for the largest number of minority students in public schools, and these figures represent a significant…
The U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics has found that certain population groups—the poor, younger persons, males, African-Americans, Hispanics, and residents of inner cities—are more likely to be victimized and are more vulnerable to violence than other groups. As discussed in other chapters of this book, African-Americans and Hispanics are more likely to be poor and to be unemployed than are whites. These factors put minorities at an especially high risk of being victimized.…
To be eligible to vote, a person must be a citizen of the United States and at least eighteen years of age. In a report to Congress on The Impact of the National Voter Registration Act of 1993 on the Administration of Elections for Federal Office 2001–2002, the Federal Election Commission reported that in 2002 there were 215.5 million total citizens eighteen years and older in the United States. Of that number, 168.4 million, or about 78 percent, were registered to vote. However, a signif…
The Gallup Organization takes polls on a regular basis to determine public opinion on discrimination, affirmative action, civil rights, and the progress that has been made by minorities in American society. Polls consistently reveal differences in the way various groups perceive many issues and in their respective levels of satisfaction. …
The U.S. Social Security Administration defines social welfare expenditures as the cost of "cash benefits, services, and the administration of public programs that directly benefit individuals and families." This broad definition includes expenditures for social security (Old-Age, Survivor's, Disability, and Health Insurance, or OASDHI), health and medical programs, education,…
The summer of 1996 brought about profound and controversial changes in the way America handles its welfare programs. Much criticism had been directed toward the previous welfare system, based mainly on Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC). This criticism centered on claims that the system produced welfare dependency rather than temporary assistance to help recipients move into a job and off welfare. According to the testimony of LaDonna Pavetti of the Urban Institute before the U.S. Ho…
The federal government began measuring poverty in 1959. During the 1960s President Lyndon Baines Johnson declared a national war on poverty. Researchers realized that very few statistical tools were available to measure the number of Americans who continued to live in poverty in one of the most affluent nations in the world. In order to fight this "war," it had to be determined who was poor and why.…
The U.S. Census Bureau has released a number of studies showing a change in the distribution of wealth and earnings in the United States. This change has resulted in an increase in the gap between the rich and the poor. Unlike many short-term economic changes that are often the product of normal economic cycles of growth and recession, these changes seem to indicate fundamental changes in American…
Poverty is the largest single factor that drives people to apply for governmental assistance, commonly called "welfare." Many researchers agree that the major factors that create poverty are family size, family background, low educational achievement, unemployment, underemployment (for example, part-time workers who want to work full-time), low wages, and the prevailing economic cond…
With few exceptions, the demand for welfare assistance increased sharply in the 1990s. Nonetheless, one-third of the poor received no benefits in 2000. Several reasons explain why more than 33 percent of those living below the poverty line did not receive the assistance available to them. Some were ineligible because they had such assets as a car or a savings account that brought them above permitted limits. Others did not know they were eligible for benefits, while some knew they were eligible …
The Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act (PRWORA; PL 104-193), the welfare-reform law enacted in 1996, ended the Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) program and replaced it with the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program. AFDC was an entitlement program that guaranteed benefits to all recipients whose income and resources were below state-deter…
"Means-tested" programs provide benefits to those whose income and financial resources meet certain requirements. More than eighty benefit programs provide cash and/or noncash aid to individuals who meet certain low-income qualifications in the United States. Cash assistance programs include Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF), the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC), and Supp…
The focus of the welfare debate has changed dramatically since the 1980s. During the early 1980s President Ronald Reagan attacked waste, fraud, and abuse in the welfare system, the conventional attack upon public welfare at the time. Since the late 1980s, however, the issue of welfare reform has focused on work programs as a means of getting people off welfare and keeping them off. Both among Republicans and Democrats, a consensus developed that jobs, either in the private sector, subsidized by …
Eight years after the passage of the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act (PRWORA; PL 104-193), welfare reform remained a hotly debated topic. In April 2003 the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) issued its fifth annual Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) report to Congress. The report showed that welfare reform has caused major changes in welf…
"The economy" is the term used to describe the system of making, distributing, and consuming material goods and services. The many facets of a country's economy include the spending habits of consumers, labor issues, employment patterns, the banking and financial industries, taxes, and the government regulation designed to help keep the economy running smoothly. There are two …
The American workforce is made up of many different types of jobs that are categorized into sectors defined by the North American Industry Classification System (NAICS; pronounced "Nakes"). Adopted in 1997, NAICS was devised by the U.S. Economic Classification Policy Committee in conjunction with Statistics Canada and the Instituto Nacional de Estadística, Geografia e Informática of Mexico, and is the standard classification system for businesses throughout the contin…
World merchandise trade totaled $7.3 trillion in 2003, and trade in commercial services reached $1.8 trillion, according to the World Trade Organization (WTO) in International Trade Statistics 2004 (Geneva, Switzerland: World Trade Organization, 2004). Despite its economic dominance—as shown by per capita Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in Figure 3.1—the United States is only one player…
Securities (stocks, bonds, and mutual funds) and commodities (raw materials and foreign currencies and securities) markets in the United States are used by corporations to raise money for their business operations and by individuals and banks to build wealth and, in some cases, pay for retirement. These markets have fueled periods of astounding economic growth (called bull markets), but they have …
From small, independent companies to international corporations, American businesses play a vital role in the functioning of the economy. The United States is often said to have a "boot strap" society, meaning that the economic opportunities provided by the country's system of government allow people to "pull themselves up by their boot straps" to succeed financi…
In February 2005 there were approximately 140.1 million people in the American labor force. The size and diversity of this group are its greatest strengths and have led to the passage of relatively strict labor laws to protect American workers from discrimination on the basis of gender, age, race, ethnicity, religion, sexual orientation, and other factors. Relatively high wages and better working conditions have attracted workers from around the world who hope to improve their standard of living…
By the early twenty-first century the United States was a society driven largely by consumerism—not just economically, but socially and culturally as well. This consumer culture, which began its rise after World War II ended in 1945, reached unprecedented levels by the early 2000s, with consumer spending accounting for more than 67% of gross domestic product in 2003. Such aggressive spendin…
Governments are responsible for providing services that individuals cannot effectively provide for themselves, such as military defense, fire and police departments, roads, education, social services, and environmental protection. To generate the revenue necessary to provide these services, governments institute taxes based on income, consumption (sales taxes), and wealth (property and estate taxes). Taxes are broadly defined as being either direct or indirect. Direct taxes (for example, the fed…
In virtually all cultures, the family is considered the basic societal unit. Because the U.S. Census Bureau provides the most comprehensive statistics available on families in America, this book uses its terms and definitions as they concern the American family. The Census Bureau conducts a nationwide population census every ten years. In addition, the Bureau gathers economic information and surve…
Three trends greatly changed the composition of the American family beginning in the early 1960s: a lower fertility rate; an increase in the number of births among young unmarried women; and women—especially working women—delaying childbearing. According to data from the National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS), in 2002 there were 4,021,726 live births in the United States, 136,4…
Since the mid-1960s, the proportion of children as part of the total U.S. population has decreased. The percentage of the population under age eighteen peaked in 1960 at 36% and began a decline to 26% by 1990. While the seventy-two million children under age eighteen still represented 26% of the population in 2000, the U.S. Census Bureau projected that by 2020 only 24% of the population would be c…
In proclaiming November 24 through November 30, 2002, National Family Week, President George W. Bush noted that earlier in the year he signed bipartisan legislation: …
The U.S. Census Bureau first began tracking poverty data in America in 1959. The following year it counted 39.9 million Americans, or about 22.2% of the population, living below the poverty level. Changes in the definition of poverty levels over the years make pre-1980 comparisons difficult, but the percentage fell to 12.3% in the mid-1970s and fluctuated over the next two decades, hitting 14% in 1985. In 2001 the poverty rate stood at 11.7% and rose to 12.1% in 2002 and 12.5% in 2003. While the…
In the spirit of the early settlers and pioneers, Americans claim mobility as their birthright. The original colonies were not long established before expansion began for more farming land. The frontier was the next piece of unexplored land to the west, and successive generations of Americans worked their way across the continent to the Pacific Ocean. After the Civil War, many freed slaves migrated to the North in search of jobs. In the twentieth century, southern cities attracted new industries…
Just before the dawn of the twenty-first century, interviewers for the Roper Institute asked Americans whether life for their family had improved since 1950. Regardless of age, gender, race, religion, or educational level, about two-thirds (63%) said that life was better at the close of the century than it had been in the past. In the public perception, women, persons with disabilities, and African-Americans had seen the greatest improvement over the previous fifty years. On the other end of the…
The recognition of child abuse in its multiple forms (physical abuse, sexual abuse, emotional abuse, and neglect) came to the forefront in the twentieth century. Child abuse continues to be more likely recognized in economically developed countries than in developing countries. Children, however, have been beaten and abandoned for many thousands of years, based primarily on the belief that children are the property of their parents.…
Child abuse is often a secret. Since the 1960s, however, Americans have become increasingly aware of the problems of child abuse and neglect (together referred to as child maltreatment). In 1963 some 150,000 young victims of maltreatment were reported to authorities (Juvenile Court Statistics, U.S. Department of Health, Education, and Welfare, Children's Bureau, Washington, DC, 1966). In 2002 state child protective services (CPS) agencies received nearly 2.6 million reports of child maltr…
In 1974 Congress enacted the first Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act (CAPTA; Public Law 93-247) that set guidelines for the reporting, investigation, and treatment of child maltreatment. States had to meet these requirements in order to receive federal funding to assist child victims of abuse and neglect. Among its many provisions, CAPTA required the states to enact mandatory reporting laws and procedures so that child protective services (CPS) agencies can take action to protect children…
Statistics on child abuse are difficult to interpret and compare because there is very little consistency in how information is collected. The definitions of abuse vary from study to study, as do the methods of counting incidents of abuse. Some methods count only reported cases of abuse. Some statistics are based on estimates projected from a small study, while others are based on interviews. In a…
Raising a child is not easy. Everyday stresses, strains, and sporadic upheavals in family life, coupled with the normal burdens of child care, cause most parents to feel angry at times. People who would not dream of hitting a colleague or an acquaintance when they are angry may think nothing of hitting their children. Some feel remorse after hitting a loved one; nevertheless, when they are angry, …
Many experts believe that sexual abuse is the most underreported type of child maltreatment. A victim, especially a very young child, may not know what he or she is experiencing. In many cases the child is sworn to secrecy. Adults who may be aware of the abuse sometimes get involved in a conspiracy of silence.…
As early as the mid-seventeenth century in colonial America, adults accused of child abandonment, of excessive physical abuse, and of depriving their children of basic necessities faced criminal trials. In 1899 Cook County, Illinois, established the first juvenile court system, not so much to protect abused and neglected children but mainly to keep the abandoned children and runaways off the streets. Then in 1944 the U.S. Supreme Court held, in Prince v. Massachusetts (321 U.S. 158), that the go…
In the early 1900s Austrian psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud first proposed the theory of repression, which hypothesizes that the mind can reject unpleasant ideas, desires, and memories by banishing them into the unconscious. Some clinicians believe that memory repression explains why a victim of a traumatic experience, such as childhood sexual abuse, may forget the horrible incident. Some also believe…
Since the 1980s, innovations in electronics and communications technologies have utterly transformed the way in which Americans lead their lives. Computers and the Internet have dramatically reduced the time needed to complete dozens of mundane tasks, such as finding directions, searching library catalogs, or researching products. Cell phones, e-mail, and instant messaging now enable people to com…
In 1985 American adults typically had one phone number for the house and one for work. By 2004, many techsavvy Americans had added such alternate communications as a cell phone, a fax line, an instant messaging account, an e-mail address for business, another for home, and still another to ward off spam. Communication has undeniably been one of the central motivations behind the technical strides …
The explosive growth of electronic and communications technologies since the 1980s was fueled in no small part by corporate America's desire to make money. Throughout the 1980s and 1990s, such high-tech companies as Microsoft and Intel strove to create affordable computers, Internet technologies, cell phones, and a variety of electronics-based products for use in the office and at home. A h…
New technologies introduce new problems into a society. Those technologies that became widespread in the 1980s and 1990s were no exception. Cell phones, the Internet, computers, and other forms of digital technology have fueled epidemics in identity theft, intellectual property theft, and other crimes that most people were hardly aware of in the 1970s. Brand new crimes related to advances in infor…
For many Americans, new technologies simply mean new toys. Nearly every advancement in consumer technology since the 1980s has in some way been tied to entertainment. Table 5.1 shows the amount of money Americans spent between 1998 and 2001 for media content, which included pay-TV subscriptions, video games, home video, and music. On average, most American adults spent $683.33 on all media in 2001…
Knowing how to use an Internet browser has become as important a skill in modern life as knowing multiplication tables. Internet illiteracy restricts a person's access to job listings, e-mail communication, online information sources, and dozens of convenient, efficient tools that make work and life easier. Aware of this, high schools and colleges in the late 1990s increased efforts to expo…
Since the 1990s, government bodies in the United States at the local, state, and federal level have made a concerted effort to use the Internet and other information technologies to streamline their operations and their dealings with the public. Much of this effort has been focused on making information available via the Internet. Local and municipal governments began posting meeting minutes and a…
Prior to the Internet, finding the latest information on a health issue typically required access to a university or medical library and specialized knowledge of the subject. Most medical studies and information existed in expensive books and journals, which were generally written for those with formal training. The Internet gave rise to a plethora of accessible, informative Web sites that average…
Since the early 1980s, high tech has been creeping into every aspect of life, becoming as invisible in many Americans' everyday lives as running water or refrigeration. Many Americans think nothing of going online to check the weather, buy tickets, plan holidays, look for religious inspiration, or find information on hobbies from coin collecting to rock climbing. The Internet also contains …
Since the advent of the Internet, the Gallup Organization, headquartered in Washington, D.C., has polled Americans about everything from their general use of computers and the Internet to the trust people place in online health-care advice. Data from a Gallup poll conducted in April 2003 revealed that 79% of Americans used a personal computer at their office, place of work, or school. A December 2…
What is gambling? Merriam-Webster's dictionary gives half a dozen definitions, including playing a game of chance for money and making a bet on an uncertain outcome. One definition says that gambling is staking something on a contingency. Another says that gambling is taking an action with an element of risk. Combining various terms together provides the following overall definition: Gambli…
Like any business in a capitalist society, the gambling industry is driven by the principles of supply and demand. Gambling proponents say that demand drives supply. In other words, the industry grows and spreads into new markets because the public is eager to gamble. Illegal gambling has always flourished, and opinion polls show that most Americans favor legal gambling opportunities—partic…
When most people think about gambling, they think about a casino. But what is a casino? According to Merriam Webster's dictionary, a casino is a "building or room used for social amusements, specifically gambling." This definition is much broader than what the average American would consider a casino to be. Most people would picture one of the megaresorts in Las Vegas—a…
Commercial casinos are those owned and operated by large and small companies. They are heavily regulated by state governments. Each state sets different limits on the types and locations of casinos permitted. Some states allow land-based casinos, while others restrict casino games to floating gambling halls on barges or riverboats. A handful of states allow slot machines at noncasino locations, such as horse and dog racetracks or other commercial establishments. Most states specify exactly which…
Indian Gaming: Final Impact Analysis (2004), a report issued by the National Indian Gaming Association (NIGA), reported that casinos operated by Native American tribes made $16.7 billion during 2003. Commercial casinos during that same year made $27 billion, as reported by the American Gaming Association (AGA) in 2004 State of the States: The AGA Survey of Casino Entertainment. Tribal casinos, the…
According to a 2002 poll conducted for the American Gaming Association (AGA) by Peter D. Hart Research Associates, Inc., and the Luntz Research Companies, Americans in favor of casinos in their communities outnumber those who disapprove of local casino gambling. Of those with an opinion, 49% indicated some degree of favor, while 40% indicated disfavor. A 2004 AGA poll showed that about two-thirds of people polled believe that casinos bring widespread economic benefits to other industries and bus…
A lottery is a game of chance in which people pay for the opportunity to win prizes. All money taken in by a lottery is pooled and used to award the winners and to pay the costs of administering the lottery. The money left over is profit. Lotteries are extremely popular around the world and are legal in more than a hundred countries. In the United States all lotteries are operated by state governm…
Wagering on sporting events is one of the oldest and most popular forms of gambling in the world. The ancient Romans gambled on chariot races, animal fights, and contests between gladiators. The Romans brought sports and gambling to Britain, where they have flourished for hundreds of years. Cockfighting, bear- and bullbaiting, wrestling, and footraces were popular sporting events for gambling thro…
Internet gambling is a relatively new phenomenon. The first gambling Web sites on the Internet launched in the mid-1990s. The new medium has since soared in popularity, particularly in the United States. Millions of Americans gamble online each year, even though the government considers the practice to be illegal. In April 2003 the U.S. Department of Justice estimated that there would be 1,800 Int…
Exactly when childhood ends and adulthood begins differs among cultures and over periods of time within cultures. People in some societies believe that adulthood begins with the onset of puberty, arguing that people who are old enough to have children also are old enough to assume adult responsibilities. This stage of life is often solemnized with special celebrations. In Jewish tradition, for example, the bar mitzvah ceremony for thirteen-year-old boys and the bat mitzvah ceremony for twelve-ye…
One of the more significant social changes to occur in the last decades of the twentieth century was a shift away from the "traditional" family structure—a married couple with their own child or children living in the home. The U.S. Census Bureau divides households into two major categories: family households (defined as groups of two or more people living together related by birth, marriage, or adoption) and nonfamily households (consisting of a person living alone or an in…
In the second half of the twentieth century the "stayat-home mom" became less common. In the early twenty-first century women with young children were much more likely to work outside the home than they had been three decades previously. In 1976 31% of women ages fifteen to forty-four with a child under twelve months old worked; by 2003 that percentage had increased to 53.7%, down from a high of 58.7% in 1998 (Fertility of American Women: June 2002, U.S. Census Bureau, 2003, and &#…
Almost all children are financially dependent upon their parents, with their financial condition directly dependent on how much their parents earn. The U.S. Census Bureau reports that real income rose throughout the 1990s and then declined from 2001 to 2003. The median (half were higher and half were lower) household income in 2003 was $43,318. For married-couple families it was $62,405—down slightly from the previous year (Carmen DeNavas-Walt, Bernadette D. Proctor, and Robert J. Mills, …
In the early twenty-first century America's young people could look forward to living longer than the generations before them had. The average life expectancy for both sexes of all races born in 2001 was 77.2 years, although individual expectations varied considerably according to race and gender. (See Table 5.1.) Average life expectancy for white males born in 2001 was seventy-five years, up from 66.5 in 1950. The average life expectancy for African-American males born in 2001 was 68.6 y…
Despite the controversies surrounding the quality and direction of American education, the United States remains one of the most highly educated nations in the world. According to the Digest of Education Statistics (U.S. Department of Education), in fall 2002 69.2 million Americans were enrolled students in elementary and secondary schools and colleges. (See Table 6.1.) An additional 4.3 million w…
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reported in its 2003 Youth Risk Behavior Survey that almost half of high school students (46.7%) had had sexual intercourse, down from the 54% who were reported as sexually active in 1991. (See Table 7.1 and Figure 7.1.) Almost one in seven (14.2%) had had sex with four or more partners. Girls (45.3%) were slightly less likely than boys (48%) to have had intercourse, and African-American students (67.3%) were more likely than Hispanics (51.4%)…
For some young people, growing up can be troubling. While their peers are playing football, going to proms, and making plans for adulthood, a certain percentage of juveniles, for whatever reason, have brushes with the law. Each state has its own definition of the term juvenile: most states put the upper age limit at seventeen years old, although some states set it as low as fourteen. In reporting …
Prior to the early twentieth century, when the economy was primarily agricultural, most American families needed their children to work on the farm during their after-school hours and on weekends. When children finished high school—and most left before they graduated (in school year 1899–1900 only 6.4% of seventeen-year-olds graduated high school)—both male and female youth were expected to contribute their full-time labor to the family economy. All activities, including sch…
Childhood should be a time of nurturing, growing, learning, playing, and preparing for adulthood. For many children, childhood is essentially a carefree, positive experience. For many others, however, even surviving childhood is a challenge. …
A few national studies periodically survey the attitudes, opinions, and behavior of American teenagers on a range of topics. For example, since 1979 the University of Michigan has conducted the annual study Monitoring the Future; the study's primary focus is monitoring drug- and alcohol-related behaviors among American secondary school students, college students, and other young adults. Mar…
The right to bear arms has long been an American tradition. From the time colonists settled on American soil, Americans have held weapons to protect themselves. Armed citizen-soldiers won America's freedom more than two centuries ago. Partly because of this long-standing tradition, attempts to control a citizen's right to own a gun evoke strong emotions. The modern debate over gun co…
There is no way of knowing the actual number of privately owned guns in the United States. Each state has its own system of counting and classifying guns. Some states do not require registration of guns, and unregistered guns cannot be included in an official count. The result is that there can only be estimates of the total number of guns that American citizens possess.…
Americans have long debated the issue of federal regulation of firearms. Those in favor of regulation argue that only federal firearm laws can limit access by criminals, juveniles, and other "high-risk" persons, thereby reducing violent crime. Supporters also contend that without federal laws, states with few firearms restrictions will supply guns illegally to states with more restrictions. Opponents of federal involvement advance Second Amendment arguments against any kind of gun …
The U.S. Constitution and most state constitutions guarantee the right to bear arms, but the courts have ruled that this right may be strictly controlled. Many laws and regulations have been enacted at the local, state, and federal levels to regulate firearms. When these laws have been challenged, state and federal courts have consistently upheld the right of governments to require the registratio…
The frequency and ways in which guns are used to commit crimes is the focus of this chapter. Many of the statistics come from the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) of the U.S. Department of Justice, which collects crime statistics through its Uniform Crime Reports program. Its annual publication Crime in the United States is a primary source for statistical information on crime. The FBI'…
Firearm-related incidents are a leading cause of preventable injury and death, particularly among young people. Doctors Against Handgun Injury, a coalition of twelve clinical and professional medical societies, calls handgun injuries a public health problem, a political issue, and a criminal justice concern. The group contends: "While we have enough data in the area of firearm injuries to k…
There was a time when feuds among teenage boys might end in nothing more dangerous than a fistfight. Unfortunately, during the 1980s and 1990s young people more often turned to guns to resolve disputes. Youth gangs and school shootings dominated news headlines. The peak decade was 1983–1993, when arrests of youths for serious violent offenses surged by 70%; the number of young people who mu…
The gun control issue has become prominent over the past fifty years, as gun users carried out political assassinations, assassination attempts, and violent crimes. Americans mourned the deaths of President John Kennedy; his brother, presidential candidate Robert Kennedy; and civil rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr. Presidents Gerald Ford and Ronald Reagan were victimized by would-be assassins, as were presidential candidate George Wallace and civil rights leaders Medgar Evers and Vernon Jord…
This chapter presents a sample of the arguments used by the proponents of strong federal gun control to support their position over the last several decades. Please see Chapter 10 for the arguments put forward by opponents of strong federal gun control. …
This chapter presents a sample of the arguments used by the opponents of strong federal gun control to support their position over the last several decades. Please see Chapter 9 for the arguments put forward by supporters of strong federal gun control. …
When asked to describe the U.S. health care system, most Americans would probably offer a description of just a single facet of a huge, complex interaction of people, institutions, and technology. Like snapshots, each account offers an image, frozen in time, of one of the many health care providers and the settings in which medical care is delivered. Examples of these include the following: Medica…
Physicians routinely perform medical examinations, provide preventive medicine services, diagnose illness, treat patients suffering from injury or disease, and offer counsel about how to achieve and maintain good health. There are two types of physicians trained in traditional Western medicine: the MD (Doctor of Medicine) is schooled in allopathic medicine and the DO (Doctor of Osteopathy) learns osteopathy. Allopathy is the philosophy and system of curing disease by producing conditions that ar…
The first hospitals in the United States were established more than two hundred years ago. No records of hospitals in the early colonies exist, but almshouses, which sheltered the poor, also cared for those who were ill. The first almshouse opened in 1662 in the Massachusetts Bay Colony. In 1756 the Pennsylvania Hospital in Philadelphia became the first American institution devoted entirely to care of the sick.…
More than twenty-five hundred agencies, institutions, and organizations are dedicated to researching, quantifying (measuring), monitoring, and improving health in the United States. Some are federally funded public entities such as the many institutes and agencies governed by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). Others are professional societies and organizations that develop st…
American society places a high value on human life, and generally wants—and expects—quality medical care. But quality care comes with an increasingly high cost. In 1970 the United States spent 7% of its gross domestic product (GDP; the value of all the goods and services produced by the nation) on health care. By 1999 health care had risen to 13% ($1.2 trillion) of the GDP, and in 2001 health care expenditures reached 14.1% ($1.4 trillion) of the GDP. Table 5.1 shows the growth in …
In 1798 Congress established the U.S. Marine Hospital Services for seamen. It was the first time an employer offered health insurance in the United States. Payments for hospital services were deducted from the sailors' salaries. In the twenty-first century, many factors affect the availability of health insurance, including employment, income, personal health status, and age. As a result, a…
International comparisons are often difficult to interpret, because definitions of terms and reliability of data as well as cultures and values differ. What is important in one society may be unimportant or even nonexistent in another. A political or human right that is important in one nation may be meaningless in a neighboring state. Evaluating the quality of health care systems is an example of…
Since the 1970s the U.S. health care system has experienced rapid and unprecedented change. The sites where health care is delivered have shifted from acute inpatient hospitals to outpatient settings such as ambulatory care and surgical centers, clinics, and physicians' offices as well as long-term care and rehabilitation facilities. Patterns of disease have changed from acute infectious di…
As with many other social issues, public opinion about health care systems, providers, plans, coverage, and benefits varies in response to a variety of personal, political, and economic forces. Personal experience, and the experience of friends, family, and community opinion leaders—trusted sources of information such as members of the clergy, prominent physicians, and local business and ci…
Throughout its history the United States has acted to protect its territories, citizenry, and interests at home and abroad. The terrorist events of September 11, 2001, heightened public interest in national security matters, and the U.S. government has asked all Americans to be watchful, suspicious, and alert to signs of danger or potential security threats. Since September 11, 2001, rarely does a…
Weapons are an integral part of any military. Conventional weapons of the early twenty-first century are accurate and deadly enough to destroy almost all types of military targets, including buried command centers, hardened aircraft shelters, and tanks and other armored vehicles. Challenging and combating the proliferation, or spread, of weapons that can be used against the United States and its a…
One of the first people to contemplate the use of biological weapons in North America was Lord Jeffrey Amherst. Amherst was the commanding general of British forces in North America during the final battles of the French and Indian War (1754–63). Carl Waldman's Atlas of the North American Indian (New York: Facts on File, 1985) describes a siege at Fort Pitt (Pittsburgh) by the forces of Native American leader Chief Pontiac during the summer of 1763. Amherst sent a letter to another…
Since the end of the cold war and the breakup of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s, the weapons of mass destruction (WMD) threat no longer focuses solely on two superpowers but includes a host of nations, among them China, Egypt, India, Iran, Israel, Libya, North Korea, Pakistan, Russia, and Syria. Figure 3.2 and Figure 3.1 (both in Chapter 3) show the countries actively involved in developing b…
While conventional weapons, such as explosives and firearms, remain the most likely means by which terrorists might attempt to harm U.S. civilians, the possibility of an attack involving biological or chemical weapons has increased. Many nations and terrorist groups have explored the use of such weapons on small and large scales, and many countries, including the United States, have chemical and/o…
On September 11, 2001, nineteen members of the al Qaeda terrorist group hijacked four U.S. commercial airliners and flew two of them into the twin towers of the World Trade Center in New York City and one into the Pentagon in Washington, D.C. The fourth plane crashed in Pennsylvania. More than three thousand people were killed and thousands more injured as a result of these devastating attacks, wh…
The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) divides terrorism into two distinct types: international terrorism and domestic terrorism. The FBI defines international terrorism as "the unlawful use of force or violence committed by a group or individual, who has some connection to a foreign power or whose activities transcend national boundaries, against persons or property to intimidate or coe…
At the apex of the U.S. federal government is the Constitution. (See Figure 8.1.) The Constitution gives the job of providing for America's national security to the president and the executive branch of the government, as well as to the legislative branch (the U.S. House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate). It designates the president the commander in chief of the American armed forces.…
Within the executive branch of the U.S. government, the Department of Defense (DOD) works directly to deal with national security threats and keep the president's military options open. For fiscal year 2005, the DOD has an estimated budget of nearly $402 billion. Of the total 2005 budget, the army receives $97.2 billion, the navy/Marine Corps gets $119.3 billion, and the air force gets $120…
Interdependence is one of the key words of foreign policy in the post-cold-war era. States are increasingly relying on each other, as well as nongovernmental and multinational entities, to accomplish their stated political and economic goals. Interdependence is complicated because it does not rely on ideological loyalties, as the communist and democratic blocs each did during the cold war. Ideolog…
The concept of U.S. national security is constantly evolving and adapting to the changing global security environment. There are a variety of emerging trends and threats with which America has not had to deal before. At the same time, the domestic national security infrastructure itself is changing. …
Second in popularity as a leisure-time activity, according to the Harris poll conducted by Taylor in 2003, was the time-honored tradition of socializing with family or children. When the 17% who named this activity were added to the 7% who cited socializing with friends or neighbors, the total who chose socializing was 24%, the same amount as the number one choice of reading. …
Americans are always finding new ways to spend their free time and money. In good economic times, people generally have more discretionary income to spend on leisure and recreation. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported in Consumer Expenditures in 2002 that in 2002 Americans spent an average of $2,079 on entertainment, slightly more than the $1,953 that was spent in 2001. (See Table 2.1.) The study further noted that persons aged thirty-five to forty-four spent the most on entertainment (…
Americans love the outdoors. Millions of Americans spend their free time participating in outdoor activities. A Harris poll conducted by Humphrey Taylor in 2003 found that of forty-six leisure-time activities cited by Americans when they were asked to list their two or three favorites, approximately a third were activities or sports in which participants were directly involved with nature.…
Many Americans like to spend their free time experiencing the fine arts. Some attend opera, ballet, or classical music performances, others go to art museums or galleries, and many curl up with a good book.…
Americans love sports, and most children grow up playing team and individual sports during their physical education programs at school and simply for fun. Many men have played baseball or softball at some time in their lives, and some continue to play in community or neighborhood leagues long after they are finished with school. Today, women are playing sports once played mainly by men, such as so…
Historically, gambling has been a popular form of recreation in North America. George Washington liked to play cards, and Benjamin Franklin printed and sold playing cards. Americans were so fond of card games that when the British Stamp Act of 1765 put a one-shilling tax on playing cards, people became extremely upset. In fact, anger about the Stamp Act and a tax on tea contributed to support for …
Americans love to take vacations. Their destinations may vary from a trip to a national park for camping, fishing, boating, or hiking, to a visit to a theme park such as Disneyland. A vacation can also be a flight to Egypt, a cruise to the Virgin Islands, a romantic three-day weekend in New York, or staying home to read a book. The way Americans vacation and travel and their expectations of vacati…
The expectations of free time have shifted and expanded over time. Eric Miller, in At Our Leisure (New York: EPM Communications, Inc., 1997), depicted recreation and leisure in the United States in the 1950s as an expression of comfort; it rounded out lives and reaffirmed the importance of home and family. During the 1960s it acquired an identity of its own apart from "traditional values." In the 1970s free time became an expression of an individual's identity; it pushed wor…
Domestic violence has existed in almost all societies throughout history. Its origin can be traced back centuries to the development of patriarchal and hierarchical systems of authority in which males controlled all property. In such systems, women and children were often considered to be the property of men. The growth of male-oriented societies promoted the widely accepted belief in male superio…
Although domestic violence has occurred for centuries, women have generally felt isolated, unsupported, and ashamed because of their victimization and frustrated in their attempts to deal with or escape the violence. The consciousness-raising groups that emerged during the rise of the second wave of U.S. feminism in the 1960s and 1970s provided small groups of women a place to discuss their proble…
Although researchers have studied wife abuse for about thirty years, scholars from different intellectual traditions often disagree on its origins and the actions required to prevent and address the problem. Sociologists and anthropologists interpret data differently from economists and political scientists. Psychologists and other therapists perceive different facets of the problem, as do social …
One of the most frequently asked questions about abused women is: Why do they stay? Some authors and advocates argue that the relevant questions for battered women themselves are very different. They believe that the very question implies there is something wrong with the woman for staying, rather than placing the blame where it belongs—on the batterer. Better questions, Barnett argues, mig…
Historically, because women have been viewed as the possessions of their fathers and husbands, sexual abuse of a woman has been considered a violation of a man's property rights rather than a violation of a woman's human rights. However, primarily through the efforts of women's advocacy groups worldwide, rape is no longer viewed as a violation of family honor but as an abuse a…
The first batterer intervention programs were established in the late 1970s. Activists working with battered women created the programs because they felt that real progress in reducing domestic violence required changing the behavior of batterers. Criminal justice agencies responded by referring an increasing number of batterers to intervention programs in an effort to deter further violence. Seve…
The police are often an abuse victim's initial contact with the judicial system, making the police response particularly important. The manner in which the police handle a domestic violence complaint will likely color the way the victim views the entire judicial system. Not surprisingly, when police project the blame for intimate partner violence on victims, the victims may be reluctant to report further abuse.…
Before the 1962 landmark case Self v. Self, when the California Supreme Court ruled that "one spouse may maintain an action against the other for battering," women had no legal recourse against abusive partners. The judicial system had tended to view wife abuse as a matter to be resolved within the family. Maintaining that "a man's home is his castle," the U.S. g…
Women do not kill their intimate partners nearly as often as men do. The National Crime Victimization Surveys estimate that intimate partner homicide accounts for just 4% of murders of men but about one-third of the murders of women. However, when women do kill, they are most likely to kill an intimate partner or other family member. In Women Offenders, a special report from the Bureau of Justice …
Recent adoption and use of the term "intimate partner violence," instead of "wife battering," "spouse abuse," or "domestic violence," is one sign of changing views about violent relationships. Intimate partner violence describes a broader range of abusive relationships, including psychological abuse and social isolation, and acknowledges that…
The family is regarded as the cornerstone of society in the United States. For many years, particularly when the United States was primarily an agricultural society, extended families—multiple generations living in the same household—were considered typical. As the culture became more urban and mobile, nuclear families—two parents and their children—became the American …
In The Condition of Education, 2005 (2005, http://nces.ed.gov/pubs2005/2005094.pdf), the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) reports that two factors—rising immigration and the baby boom echo—boosted public school enrollment from the latter part of the 1980s and into the first half of the 2000s, reaching an estimated 48.3 million in 2004. Enrollment is projected to contin…
