$2.00 a Day: Living on Almost Nothing in America

Kathryn J. Edin and H. Luke Shaefer 2015

Devastation Rating

Emotionally Ruined
poverty welfare America inequality

Our Take

In the richest country in human history, entire families survive on less than two dollars per person per day. Edin and Shaefer document this fact with the patience of archaeologists and the fury of prosecutors. The welfare reforms that were meant to end poverty simply ended welfare. What remained is this: people holding themselves together with almost nothing, in almost no one's sight.

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