Huh?
Half of U.S. Households Took Government Benefits in 2010
Derek Thompson
Atlantic, 17 January 2012
Is this statistic a watershed mark of our decline into socialism, a totally reasonable outcome from the Great Recession, or, somehow, both things at the same time?
A record-high 49% of the population lived in a household receiving some type of government benefit in the second quarter of 2010, according to Census data reported by the Wall Street Journal. Most of this group received so-called “means tested” benefits like food stamps, subsidized housing or Medicaid. Many are also benefiting from unemployment insurance spending, which has quadrupled since the downturn.
