Do Any USA State has a poverty level compared to a 3rd Level Country?

Yes, it's a dirty little secret Americans try to hide from the world, but many of us overseas do know about. We find it shocking, knowing three and a half million Americans and there families are living in squalid lower than third world conditions.

In tent cities, under plastic tarps and/or thin nylon non weather proof tents with no running water, toilets, showers or any hot water and cooking facility's. While others live and sleep in there cars or are squatting in abandon building's. Eating out of soup kitchens, garbage cans or begging and scrapping, cans, bottles, newspapers, copper pipes and car parts to buy food.

I seen this with my own eyes, by spending four weeks traveling the USA meeting, interviewing, taking several thousand photographs and recorded hours of video footage. Interviewing Americans living in these conditions and the wonderful volunteers. I met and befriended who are helping the best way they can in the non government funded cash strapped charity organisations.

Who disparately need monetary funds to supply, infant formula, toothpaste, tooth brushes, soap, razors, shampoo, sanitary napkins, toilet paper, aspirins, pain killers, anti biotics, and anti depression medication and asthma pumps for these persons.

Not one of these American persons, I met living in these disgusting conditions were looking for hand outs. They needed a hand up to help them get out of this situation. To get a job and a roof over there head, that President Bush never offered to them.

Americans can't blame President Obama for this, these people have been living in these sub standard conditions in the United States for over the last eight years.

I have traveled to over 45 global countries, even in the very poorest of third world countries, I visited. Impoverished persons in these countries lived in, favelas, shanty towns, or in slums. Which most have clean running and rain water, electricity, sewerage, toilets, hot showers, washing, cooking, food distribution, and medical distribution facility's.

During my four weeks traveling all across the USA, I can name many states in the US, the worse states were California and Florida. There are over 8,000 Americans living in these conditions just a few minutes walk from Disneyland and the amusement parks in Orlando.

Other states in the US didn't fair much better, most of middle America is abandon factory's and closed down mom and pop businesses and stores, and boarded up houses with foreclosure signs on them. Even four years after Hurricane Katrina, Louisiana still remains in ruins even though many foreign countries, including mine monetarily donated thousands of millions of dollars in foreign aid, to rebuild it and help the people of Louisiana.

With the growing population and lack of new infrastructure, and cheap affordable rental housing and growing unemployment in the USA. The US federal and state governments, need to look at a solution to house Americans rather than leaving them living in tents. By building brick favela type temporary free housing like in Brazil, with clean running water and electricity.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Favela-CCBY.jpg

Thousands of these American men and women living in these conditions are from the building trade, carpenters, electricians, plumbers, tilers, brick layers, painters, teachers, hospital staff and ex military personal etc who have lost there jobs and homes.

If the US government offered them a hand up by increasing there welfare payments by $100 a fortnight as an work for welfare and skilled apprentice training employment incentive. To all of these skilled workers to build these favelas to house them and others homeless like them.

Over 95% of unemployed Americans currently unable to find work would apply, for this government $100 a fortnight work for welfare and skill training employment incentive.

It will keep unemployed skilled Americans hands on working and young Americans learning a skilled trade, to get skilled trade jobs overseas While building housing for the three and a half million homeless middle and low income earners.

I have travelled a lot but I have never been to some of the poorer states of america and seen the poverty described by some of the answerers. Despite this nothing can compare to some of the things i have seen in africa.

This one village i went to a few months ago was leagues below living in a trailer park barely receiving a bad education due to poor government funding as one answerer described. The village itself was a series of mud huts and there was obviously no electricity/running water whatsoever. Washing was all done in the Zambezi river and its tributaries which are notorious for crocodile attacks.

There closest hospital was an eight hour drive away on a small dirt track which had about 1 lorry come down it a week. There was a school building which had three classrooms in it and the classes each had about 60 kids in of varying ages.

What really got to me was despite the awful conditions that they lived in they were happy and friendly they all were. That and playing football on a bare dusty piece of ground with a group of them are memories that will stick with me forever

I appreciate that things are bad in America for some families and I feel truly sorry for those who live in the poorer states with very little, but it can not compare with how some people live in countless numbers of these small villages across africa.

Another place that I have been to that warrants a mention are the shanty towns of Rio de Jeniro, here entire families live in a home made cube or metal and other materials they have collected

Parts of the American Deep South and parts of Appalachia are extremely poor, and are nowhere near first world standards. You can drive through parts of the Deep South and see towns that have been totally abandoned and ignored by the state government, yet people live in those places. Horrible road conditions, outdated infrastructure, broken concrete sidewalks with weeds growing through, impoverished trailer parks ... maybe if they're lucky there's a few street lights hanging from a wire span cable. In some of these places, children don't go to school, or if they do go to school, they go to school in old outdated buildings that barely receive any state or federal funding. Most people in these areas don't have access to proper grocery stores and the only places to eat are at fast food establishments. I wouldn't go to the extent of saying these are places that are absolutely third world, they have the basics to survive but that's it.

If people don't believe this, all you have to do is take a drive through rural Mississippi, Louisiana, Alabama, Kentucky, etc. Google street view has all these areas covered ... take a look for yourself. Take a look at Shaw, Mississippi on Google street view and see what that place looks like. Other developed countries wouldn't allow places in their country to get that bad.

In most of these places, the politicians that are elected there are right-wing Republicans who have a "fend for yourself" outlook on life. They don't care about anyone else but themselves, and they certainly don't care about the poverty that exists there. These are politicians who are opposed to taxing the rich, therefore there isn't enough tax revenue in these states to properly look after the entire state, and parts get abandoned and run down. These right-wing Republican politicians from down south usually tout about America being "the greatest nation on earth" ... and perhaps that's true if you're a Wall St. banker, but if you had the misfortune of being born in the Deep South, America is not the greatest place on earth.

However it should be made very clear that not all of the US is like this. These conditions only exist in the Deep South. There's poor areas of northern cities, but people in those areas do have access to proper government assistance.

Mississippi and Louisiana have some very, very poor areas where children are NOT educated as they should be because of a distinct lack of funding. (Unfair division of gov. money)

Another place are the "reservations" in some areas where First Nation peoples were forced to accept and live many years ago.

Inner city areas can be very poor as well. Detroit is a perfect example of the companies that people worked for pulling out in favour of "better" facilities in other countries or further out- rather than retrofitting what they already owned. So much money that they don't even think about society, community and the environment.

Unfortunately yes, and some of them, and in a country where the eyes of the world are upon it, it's a great shame, a backyard that our own past and present leaders do not want anyone to see.

I've seen terrible things, and one of them is Louisiana and secluded places of Mississippi.

It's not their people's fault, our government should be Equal to the "50 States". Period!

In the State of Kentucky, some whites are so poor. It was featured in Feed the Children. It is really worst than the 3rd world!

I would defintely have to say the southern red-neck states with all the mobile home living with pick-up trucks up on blocks with refrigerators on their front porch filled with cheap beer. To fill the look one must have that stupid rebel flag! Their wives must no more than 3 teeth and 12 kids hanging onto them!!

Even 3rd world countries have a diverse range of living conditions among themselves. To the poorest 3rd world country, obviously the United States cannot even compare anywhere within it's borders.

Okay...so you're saying there's actually an area of the United States with a poverty level and the resulting living conditions equal with Zimbabwe? Hilarious...I guess I don't need to be so hard on Americans after all.

there is poor parts everywhere.