HUNGER IN the United States may be quieter than that portrayed in Third World media coverage, but it exists to an alarming degree ("Silver lining in gray clouds of 'poverty,' " Letters, May 8). Americans who live at poverty level ($20,600 or less in annual income for a family of four) may not be starving, but they do run out of food at the end of the month. They do feed their children cereal and water for dinner. They do eat fatty junk food and carbohydrates because they're cheap. Their lives are colored by financial anxiety and loss of hope.
There is no way that people living at poverty level can pay for rent, heat, food, and other necessities. The current average cost of a two-bedroom apartment in Boston is $1,645 a month, or $19,740 a year - consuming almost the entire income of a poverty-level family of four. The cost of home heating oil has gone up 60 percent in the past year.
In Boston, 107,000 people, or 19 percent of the population, subsist on incomes below this harsh poverty level. Twenty-nine percent of Boston children under age 5 live in poverty. Six percent of Massachusetts residents work full time for salaries below the poverty level. Ask any of these families if the cloud of poverty casts a shadow over their lives.
ROBERT M. COARD, President and CEO
Action for Boston Community Development, Boston
