Maggie's Farm

At Tatler (my bolds):

According to the government’s own survey data, in 2005, the average household defined as poor by the government lived in a house or apartment equipped with air conditioning and cable TV. The family had a car (a third of the poor have two or more cars). For entertainment, the household had two color televisions, a DVD player, and a VCR.

If there were children in the home (especially boys), the family had a game system, such as an Xbox or PlayStation. In the kitchen, the household had a microwave, refrigerator, and an oven and stove. Other household conveniences included a washer and dryer, ceiling fans, a cordless phone, and a coffee maker.

The home of the average poor family was in good repair and not overcrowded. In fact, the typical poor American had more living space than the average European. (Note: That’s average European, not poor European.) The average poor family was able to obtain medical care when needed. When asked, most poor families stated they had had sufficient funds during the past year to meet all essential needs.

Read it and weep, you all in Euroland. Mind you, the majority of American "poor" are mother-only households, too. Maybe our War on Poverty did work, after all, despite the minor detail that it enabled all of the single-parent families with unsupervised kids and alley-cat boyfriends. That's the Law of Unintended Consequences, or the Law of Incentives. Anyway, time to end that War. 40 years of antibiotics ought to suffice for the material comforts and conveniences.

Of course, there is more to life than that, the things money cannot buy and that no government can deliver. And, believe me, those HDTVs will get you get nowhere in life unless lazy and distracted is your goal.

Image is Norman Rockwell's vision of one of FDR's Four Freedoms, Freedom From Fear. In my view, the only Freedom From Fear would be a lobotomy, and the only Freedom from Want is death.