Sacramento tent city is just one of dozens in an ailing America

A revival of a part of the not-so-good old days of the Depression of the 1930’s. “It ain’t that pretty at all!”

Across America, from Washington State to Nevada, Georgia and even Florida, homeless advocacy groups and city agencies are reporting the biggest rise in homeless encampments in a generation, as the US economy takes a spectacular plunge….

The economic figures behind her call for community action have been relentless. The recession, which began as a crisis of homeowners unable to pay their mortgages but has spread to every part of the economy, took away 650,000 Americans’ jobs for a record third straight month in February as unemployment climbed to a 25-year peak of 8.1 per cent. Around 12.5 million people are looking for work – more than the population of the state of Pennsylvania. No one is immune: the jobless rate for college graduates has hit its highest point.

The result is a proliferation of tent cities, such as the one in Sacramento. While it is the best-known shantytown in America – thanks mostly to an Oprah Winfrey special on the “new faces of the homeless” last month – it is only one of dozens. California, with its milder weather, has always attracted its fair share of people living on the streets. But the Golden State is being hit hard by the recession. In February it had the highest number of repossession filings – 80,775 – of anywhere in the US, up 51 per cent in a year according to the website RealtyTrac. Auction sale notices almost tripled to 18,831.

The outcome of the various bail-out and stimulus porkulus efforts may alleviate the situation in the short term, but reality will once again raise its ugly head and rub our noses in the harsh reality that we cannot, on an individual or national level, continually live beyond our means. The inevitable inescapable correction will be worse, the longer it is staved off.