Two-thirds of Americans say that the divide between rich and poor is now the greatest source of conflict in the US society, causing more divergence than immigration, race and age, a new survey shows.
The survey released by the Pew Research Center on Wednesday, revealed that tensions over the wealth divide in the US were at the highest level for a quarter of a century.
Researchers found thirty percent of Americans feel there are very strong conflicts between the poor and the rich Americans, while 36 percent of respondents say there are “strong” conflicts among rich and poor.
Meanwhile, a slightly smaller share of Americans, 62 percent, believes there is a similar level of conflict between immigration and native born American.
In a similar survey conducted in 2009, Americans considered immigration the most significant source of social conflict, when 47 percent observed strong tension between classes,
The new survey showed that an even a smaller number of Americans, 38 percent, believe there is a conflict between different races in the US, while 34 percent said such issue exists between the young and old.
The new findings comes while America’s top 1 percent of the population saw their incomes skyrocket by 275 percent between 1979 and 2007, while the bottom fifth of earners experienced just a 20 percent rise in income, according to the Congressional Budget Office.
The overall US awareness of class conflict has grown significantly recently, mainly due to the Occupy Wall Street movement, which has seized upon the issue.
The Occupy Wall Street (OWS) protests against poverty, high unemployment and economic inequality spread from a single camp in New York City on September 17 to hundreds of cities across the US.
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December 12, 2011 photo shows people waiting to talk with potential employers at a job fair sponsored by National Career Fairs in New York.
About 10 million more Americans reportedly joined the poor in the country between 2006 and 2010, with the number of the poor set to rise due to slow economic recovery.
The number of the US citizens living in poverty increased to 46.2 million in 2010, up 27 percent from 36.5 million in 2006, the year before which the recession began, showed a study by Indiana University, which was released on Wednesday.
During the period, the US population has also risen by 3.3 percent, reaching about 310 million now.
According to the definition of poverty in the country, people are poor when their annual income falls below USD 22,113 for a family of four.
The study used 2010 US Census Bureau data as well as other figures issued by the government.
Poverty could have increased again last year due to sluggish economic recovery, high jobless figures, and long durations of unemployment, the survey pointed out.
It noted that the official unemployment rate was decreasing since many Americans had simply stopped searching for jobs.
The gloomy data came as protests are raging on across the country against ‘corporate greed’ and high-level corruption.
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Source: PressTV
