EDITORIAL
In a land of plenty poverty increases

For the second straight year, our current national economic policy appeared to do a whole lot more for rich people than for the poor and middle classes.

The number of Americans living in poverty increased and the median household income declined in 2002 and 2001, the first two-year downturn in a decade.

Poverty, for a family of four, is defined as an annual income of $18,392 or less.

The Census Bureau's annual Current Population Survey showed that the official poverty rate rose to 12.1 percent in 2002 from 11.7 percent the year before, bringing the total number of people living below the poverty line to 34.6 million.

The poor may not be getting a lot poorer, but there are more of them. Meanwhile, you can bet that the rich, as the stock market recovers and the Bush tax cuts kick in, will get richer. And the gap between the two will widen.