I'm obviously jumping in on something that's been going on for some time and has gone off on another tangent - but I have to point something out.
There's a big uproar because somebody apparently referred to walmart employees as low income... I'm not clear why that's a problem when it's a FACT.
Walmart (et al.) non-management employees make very little money, hence they are LOW INCOME.
There is, of course, the occasional exception of teh housewife who just works for something to do or the retiree who just wants to keep busy... but unless you are using the term low income as a euphemism for something else, I am really not clear why there is any debate over this - or what the righteous indignation some have expressed is all about.
I have 6 years of college behind me - yet due to unforseen circumstances (and the fact that my ex went psycho), I ended up in pretty bad circumstances. I had a newborn, was living in the middle of nowhere, no vehicle because when it broke I couldn't afford to fix it, and so it was very difficult to find a way to get a job and be able to show up. When I finally found one, I had no money to pay for day care... I tried to go through the county's child care assistance program, but there was only 1 provider who had openings, and she only worked a couple days a week.
His father makes over $120K a year, but managed to manipulate teh courts to avoid child support for 15 months, so I got no help from him. It was a nightmare. Unless you have actually been there, you really can't understand how difficult a catch-22 situation like that can be. Sometimes having an education doesn't mean a thing. It really is a viscious cycle.