Is Europe becoming more economically secure than the US?

http://money.cnn.com/2014/05/15/news/economy/europe-gdp/index.html?iid=SF_E_LN
The article, "Pinch me! Europe grew faster than the US" was written on May 15, 2014 by Mark Thompson.

For the first time in years, European economic growth has become greater than the United States'. It looks as if they have been steadily improving over the past few years, as the US has been fluctuating greatly.



The United States blames its bad weather conditions for the downfall this year, but personally, I believe that the economy has just gone south. Meanwhile, Europe prospered from the snowy weather the Us has. They are rising out of a recession at a slow and steady rate. But then again, slow and steady wins the race in the long run.

What does this mean? This means that the economy is doing very poorly if Europe is ahead of us. We have a lot of work to do if we wish to push ahead and improve ourselves. Also, Europe is doing very well for itself. From viewing the graph above, it looks as if European nations have a good thing going for them and they should keep on doing what they are doing. The US, on the other hand, needs to change its plan of attack and think of more ways for us to economically secure. We need to allow the country to pay off our debts before we can finally truly begin to rise again.

Workers Demand More Everywhere

http://money.cnn.com/2014/05/07/news/companies/fast-food-worker-strikes-150-cities/index.html?iid=s_mpm
On May 7, 2014, the article "Fast food worker strikes planned in 150 cities" was written by Patrick M. Sheridan.

More and more fast-food workers are planning to strike on May 15, 2014 all across America and this movement is starting to spread over seas to other countries as well. These strikes are due to workers wanting higher wages and for their rights to be respected. The strike started on Wednesday in NYC at a McDonald's where workers tried to deliver a letter asking for these demands. When security would not take the letter, the strikers posted it on McDonald's front door where it was removed soon afterwards.

This movement has been going on for 2 years and has spread to more than 100 cities, such as Chicago, Boston, Memphis, etc. Currently, some of these strikes are working and made workers are getting exactly what they have demanded. Workers from all over are demanding to be payed a minimum wage of $15 an hour and be allowed to form unions without retaliation. Currently, the minimum wage for the country is $9 an hour. This is about $18,500 a year. This is less than Census Bureau's poverty income level of a family of four.

Raising minimum wage and keeping it the safe can both good and bad for the economy in my perspective. By paying more, owners are less likely to have as many employees as they won't be able to afford all of them. This will result in more people losing their jobs and not being able to afford their necessities. This lowers the standard of living and increases the overall poverty rate. On the other hand, people are already suffering from the previously stated reasons due to not being payed enough, even though they are working long hours. Overall, I believe that it is better for more to succeed and be paid more, than allow the whole economy to suffer in the long run. I believe that this article truly shows what the economy is going through right now and it shows how big of a problem our low minimum wage is now.

Are you spending too much in Rent????

http://money.cnn.com/2014/05/01/real_estate/rent-spending/index.html?iid=A_E_News
The article, One in three Americans are spending too much much on rent, by Les Christie was posted on May 1, 2014

The article is about how about 1/3 of our population in the United States is now becoming very poor because of their rent. People pay more than 30% of their monthly median income on their households. In some areas, it can be as high as up to 66% of their income. This allows America to be the home to some of the poorest communities in the world. Many are afraid of being foreclosed and have gone into renting houses, this has made a huge demand for rental housing. Causing homeowners to flourish and renters to lose their money.
This is very bad for the economy as it is making many go bankrupt and also, some are having to leave their homes because of this. Also, many are having to not buy their necessities as they have no more money after their rents. This is making the economy go down very very rapidly, leaving homeowners and renters in two very different positions. Homeowners are exploiting the renters daily and soon the only people with money are going to be the homeowners. This needs to be stopped immediately before this effects the US even more than it has. If we don't stop it soon, many are going to be finding themselves homeless and without money to provide them shelter.