Abstract
The poor shall never cease out of the land," according to the Bible. Rather being a pessimistic forecast, this prophecy is an acknowledgement that each society defines poverty in its own terms. Primarily because poverty is a relative concept, more than one American in eight is considered poor according to government statistics. In less affluent countries, poverty is equated with living at the brink of subsistence. In United States of America, even the lowest-income families are rarely confronted with the specter of starvation, though many have inadequate diets. As a relative concept, poverty will always be with us because inequality has persisted throughout recorded history. No system distributes income evenly, nor necessarily should it. The reasons for inequality of income are many, some worthy and others unrealistic. Income distribution in the United States today is little different from the pattern just after World War II. This paper is an introduction to the concept of poverty, its prevalence in the United States, and the various government efforts that have attempted to diminish poverty -- or so they claim. The authors have also tried to investigate why there is poverty in America despite public welfare programs, proposal for welfare reforms, and the efforts of the political system in dealing with the poverty problem.

Yasmeen Yousif Pardesi, Muhammad Yousif Pardesi, Sajjad Hyder Channar. (2013) THE IMPACT OF POLITICAL SYSTEM IN DEALING WITH THE POVERTY PROBLEM IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Journal of Social Science and Humanities, Volume 52, Issue 1.
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