Photographing America’s Poverty Problem

The Takeaway

New Census numbers  show that the U.S. has reached its worst level of poverty since 1983.  About 15 percent of Americans live beneath the poverty line. That means that almost 46 million Americans do not earn $11,100 dollars a year as a single person; or, that they live in a family of four that makes under $22,314. The numbers beg the question: are the poor being forgotten in this country? Photojouranlist Steve Liss  says that the problem of poverty may be even worse than the Census data suggests.  Liss  is a professor of photojournalism at Columbia College in Chicago and director of AmericanPoverty.Org, where he documents poverty with vivid photographs.

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