In the United States, the gap between rich and poor has grown exponentially in recent years. Nowhere is that more apparent than in the number of Americans who do not earn enough to feed themselves and their families. It is likely that some 50 to 60 million Americans, or one in five, are hungry. How is it possible in the land of plenty? And what does the recession reveal about America’s social safety net?
Sasha Abramsky, a senior fellow at Demos and the author of Breadline USA: The Hidden Scandal of American Hunger and How to Fix It, Aubretia Edick, a longtime Wal-Mart employee, Franceska Dillella, a mother of three whose struggle to navigate New York’s homeless shelters with her three children was recently profiled in the Indypendent, Mary Brosnahan, Executive Director of the Coalition for the Homeless on why the subject of hunger and homelessness has received so little attention.