The "Real" America: Near Record 20% Struggle To Afford Food

With US equity markets on a 7-day roll and excited TV anchors proclaiming the worst over and new all-time highs must signal recovery as they 'celebrate' five years on from Lehman, the following two charts of the state of real America should open a few eyes to just how blinded American has become to the truth (unless you live it).

A stunning 20.0% of Americans were found to have struggled to afford food in the last year - surging in recent months to its highest since the peak of the crisis in 2008 - as American's ability to consistently afford food has not recovered to pre-recession levels. Furthermore, Americans access to basic needs (13 factors including housing, healthcare, and food) hovers near record lows - dramatically lower than pre-recession levels. The Gallup polls point to a very different image of American than Dow 15,000 - and is set to get worse as the food stamp program is set to be cut in November.

More Americans are struggling to afford food -- nearly as many as did during the recent recession. The 20.0% who reported in August that they have, at times, lacked enough money to buy the food that they or their families needed during the past year, is up from 17.7% in June, and is the highest percentage recorded since October 2011. The percentage who struggle to afford food now is close to the peak of 20.4% measured in November 2008, as the global economic crisis unfolded. Read more >>

Americans hate their jobs

If you hate your job, you're not alone. But having in-office access to catered meals, a pingpong table or free massages may not make you any happier at work.

Just 30% of employees are engaged and inspired at work, according to Gallup's 2013 State of the American Workplace Report, which surveyed more than 150,000 full- and part-time workers during 2012. That's up from 28% in 2010. The rest … not so much. A little more than half of workers (52%) have a perpetual case of the Mondays — they're present, but not particularly excited about their job.

The remaining 18% are actively disengaged or, as Gallup CEO Jim Clifton put it in the report, "roam the halls spreading discontent." Worse, Gallup reports, those actively disengaged employees cost the U.S. up to $550 billion annually in lost productivity.

No wonder companies have been looking for ways to make workers happier. One trend that has taken off is cushy office perks, said management consultant Bob Nelson, author of 1,501 Ways to Reward Employees. For example, Google — which has topped the Fortune and the Great Place to Work Institute's annual list of 100 Best Companies to Work For in four of the past seven years — boasts a roller hockey rink and nap pods, among other amenities, at its Mountain View, Calif., headquarters. Read more >>

Gallup: Americans' Confidence in Newspapers Continues to Erode

Couple this with NSA and Obama's plummeting approval ratings, and we have a major shift in the collective attitude toward the status quo underway.  

Americans' confidence in newspapers fell slightly to 23% this year, from 25% in 2012 and 28% in 2011. The percentage of Americans saying they have "a great deal" or "quite a lot" of confidence in newspapers has been generally trending downward since 1979, when it reached a high of 51%.

Newspapers rank near the bottom on a list of 16 societal institutions Gallup measured in a June 1-4 survey. Television news is tied with newspapers on the list, with 23% of Americans also expressing confidence in it. That is up slightly from the all-time low of 21% found last year. The only institutions television news and newspapers beat out this year are big business, organized labor, Health Maintenance Organizations (HMOs), and Congress.

Americans' confidence in television news was highest, at 46%, in 1993, when Gallup first asked about it. The question does not indicate the specific type of television news, meaning respondents could be thinking about anything ranging from cable news channels to local news when answering the survey. Read more >>

Nine in 10 Americans have no confidence in Congress

Nine in 10 Americans say they have no confidence in Congress, ranking it last on a list of 16 institutions for the fourth straight year, Gallup said Thursday. The 10 percent confidence level is the lowest level registered for any institution since Gallup began this poll in 1973, Gallup said.

At 76 percent, Americans said they were most confident in the military. Small business and the police also ranked high, at 65 percent and 57 percent, with Americans expressing "a great deal" or "quite a lot" of confidence in these institutions, the Princeton, N.J., polling agency said.

Also at the bottom of the list were health maintenance organizations, at 19 percent, and organized labor, at 21 percent. Confidence in Congress has been at its lowest points for several years, Gallup said. The high point was in 1973, when 42 percent of Americans said they had confidence in Congress.

Results are based on nationwide phone interviews with 1,529 adults conducted June 1-4. The margin of error is 3 percentage points.

Source

Poll: Majority of Americans believe federal government too powerful

The 54 percent that expressed that belief, however, is only slightly higher than reported in 2012 and slightly lower than reported in 2010 and 2011, Gallup said. Only 8 percent of Americans said they thought the federal government has "too little" power, while 36 percent said the government has about the right amount of power, the Princeton, N.J., polling agency said.

Results indicated more than twice as many Republicans as Democrats said the government has too much power, 76 percent to 32 percent. Forty-six percent of Americans said they agreed with the statement that the federal government "poses an immediate threat to the rights and freedoms of ordinary citizens," while 53 percent disagree, Gallup said.

Gallup said recent allegations that the IRS targeted conservative organizations and reports of U.S. Justice Department investigations into The Associated Press and Fox News records and emails did not alter Americans' views of the federal government's power. Read more >>

1 in 5 Americans cannot afford to buy food

The results of a new poll show that American citizens are still experiencing difficulty in affording food for themselves or their families, a sign which proves that the country’s economy is not on the road to recovery. A total of 177,662 adults from across the United States responded to the poll conducted by Gallup organization via phone from January through June 2012.

According to the findings, which were made public on August 21, almost one in five Americans in 15 states say they had trouble buying food at least once during the past 12 months. “Nationwide, 18.2 percent of Americans so far in 2012 say there have been times when they could not afford the food they needed, on par with the 18.6 percent who had trouble affording food in 2011,” the Gallup poll results also stated.

The poll further highlighted that residents in southern states such as Mississippi and Alabama are among the most likely to struggle to afford food. The development comes as worsening drought in the United States has pushed grain prices to new highs as crops are withering and the temperatures are rising. At the same time, corn and soybean production in the US has slashed to a six-year low due to the drought. Read more >>

Americans' Confidence in Television News Drops to New Low

Lymari Morales
WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Americans' confidence in television news is at a new low by one percentage point, with 21% of adults expressing a great deal or quite a lot of confidence in it. This marks a decline from 27% last year and from 46% when Gallup started tracking confidence in television news in 1993.

The findings are from Gallup's annual update on confidence in U.S. institutions, conducted June 7-10 this year. As such, the findings preceded the erroneous initial reports by cable-news networks CNN and Fox News regarding the U.S. Supreme Court's June 28 decision about the constitutionality of the U.S. healthcare law.
Among 16 U.S. institutions tested, television news ranks 11^th, following newspapers in 10^th place. The 25% of adults who express a great deal or quite a lot of confidence in newspapers is down slightly from 28% last year. Confidence in newspapers is now half of what it was at its peak of 51% in 1979.

This year's updates mark a setback from last year for both television news and newspapers, when Americans appeared to be regaining some confidence in these institutions, though they are more in line with 2007-2010 readings. Read more >>

Confidence in US Public Schools at Record Low

A new poll says that confidence in U.S. public schools has dropped to the lowest level in nearly four decades. Twenty-nine percent of those questioned in a Gallup poll said they had a "great deal" or "quite a lot" of confidence in public schools. Forty percent had some confidence while 30 percent expressed little or none.

When Gallup first measured confidence in public schools in 1973, 58 percent reported having a strong belief in the country's educational system. Since then, that number has steadily tracked downward. Read more >>

Sales of Home Safes Skyrocket Over Anger and Distrust of Banks

In an era marked by financial turbulence, it's probably not surprising that safes have become a popular commodity, with some manufacturers, retailers and installers reporting sales increases of as much as 40 percent from a few years ago. 

In a Gallup poll last year, a record-high 36 percent of Americans said they had "very little" or "no" confidence in U.S. banks. (In 2008 and 2009, when the financial crisis was peaking, that figure stood at 22 and 29 percent, respectively.) And growing concern about identity theft has made some people more eager to keep their assets in a form they can see and count, says R. Brent Lang, an investment manager in Surrey, British Columbia: "By acquiring one password, someone can wipe out all your digital wealth," he says. More...

U.S. Homeownership Hits Decade Low

PRINCETON, NJ - The 62% of Americans who say they own their own home marks a new low since Gallup began tracking self-reported homeownership in 2001.

The current level of homeownership marks a decline from 68% in 2011. For most of the prior decade, roughly seven in 10 Americans reported owning their own home. While the recession and financial crisis took place in 2008-2009, homeownership rates didn't begin to reflect the bursting of the housing bubble until 2010, when 65% of Americans reported owning their own home -- the lowest level recorded before this year. More...

Gallup Finds U.S. Unemployment Hitting 10.3% in February

Dennis Jacobe, Chief Economist

PRINCETON, NJ -- Unemployment, as measured by Gallup without seasonal adjustment, hit 10.3% in February -- up from 9.8% at the end of January. The U.S. unemployment rate is now essentially the same as the 10.4% at the end of February 2010.

The percentage of part-time workers who want full-time work worsened considerably in February, increasing to 9.6% of the workforce from 9.1% at the end of January. A larger percentage of the U.S. workforce is working part time and wanting full-time work now than was the case a year ago (9.3%).

Underemployment Surges in February
Underemployment, a measure that combines part-time workers wanting full-time work with those who are unemployed, surged in February to 19.9%. This resulted from the combination of a sharp 0.5-point increase since the end of January in the percentage unemployed and a 0.5-point increase in the percentage working part time but wanting full-time work. Underemployment is now higher than it was at this point a year ago (19.7%).

Jobs Situation Deteriorates in February
There is essentially no difference between the unemployment rate now and the one at this time a year ago; January's rate, in contrast, showed a 1.1-percentage-point year-over-year improvement. This suggests that the real U.S. jobs situation worsened in February. That is, jobs are relatively less available now than in January. Read More...

Gallup Polling Paints Much Bleaker Economic Outlook Picture Than UMichigan

Even as the increasingly more unreliable UMichigan consumer confidence index surged more than expected in June, to the highest reading in two years, in yet another doctored attempt to stimulate consumers to buy assorted trinkets they don't need and max out their credit cards, a comparable, and traditionally much more comprehensive Gallup polls, paints a vastly different picture. As the chart below demonstrates, the spread between those who see the economy as getting better (32%) and worse (63%) has hit 31, and is threatening to break out the highest reading recorded in the past year. It is no surprise that with nobody trading at all, US stocks are back to their old trickey of spiking ever higher on no volume and on increasingly worse news out of Europe, and not to mention on an atrocious NFP and retail saels report for May, both of which are now promptly forgotten. More...

US polls show lowest approval for Obama, Congress

www.presstv.ir
New US polls show the lowest job approval rating for President Barack Obama as well as a declining endorsement of the already low-regarded Congress among the American public.

For the first time, according to the latest opinion polls, Obama appears to mirror his predecessor George W. Bush as his disapproval ratings exceed his approval figures.

Results of the latest Gallup poll on Obama's Job performance suggests a 61% disapproval score, while most polls place his disapproval figure at the 48% mark.

Some political analysts link Obama's disapproval rating to the persisting high jobless rate in the US.

"His approval rating track almost perfectly with the unemployment rate. So it turns out you would expect him whatever he had done, just given these economic conditions, you would expect an approval rating of below 50 percent," Thomas Mann of the political think-tank Brookings Institution told Press TV's Mike Kellerman.

Yet, there are others who think that the US president's efforts in polarizing the nation's political parties account for Obama's low approval numbers.

"I think one of the problem is he's polarized this government more than an other president [in American] history. He campaigned on being bipartisan and I think in the one year he has been in the office, he has really polarized the country and made that a lot worse in the political environment," an Obama supporter told the Press TV correspondent.

The US Congress, on the other hand, does much worse than Obama in the polls.

Nine out of 10 Americans maintain that Congress is doing a terrible job.

The new Harris poll finds that only 10 percent of Americans believe Congress is doing a good Job, down from 16 percent in January. That also constitutes an all-time low.