America Over the Past Fifty Years

As 2007 rolls in, nearly three million new Americans are added to the population of the United States of America. The population has hit a bang in numbers topping the charts at 300,900,000 and counting. The United States over population has several factors that feed into the problems we face in today's world as well as the advantages it has given us through education. The average cost of living has risen to the point of causing America to be driven over 800 billion dollars in debt. America has had a big jump in prices from 1957 to 2007. In 1957, the population was around 40,000,000, nearly eight times lower than today's population. America is about half the size of Russia and almost three time the size of The European Union. America has a lot of freedom. Citizens from other countries migrate to the America nearly everyday due to the many advantages that America has. However; the rapid growth of population has also lead to a lot more crime, more poverty, and a large incline to the cost of living.

Fifty years ago in 1957, the prices were almost ten times cheaper than today's prices. You must take in mind however; the annual income was only around $4,500 annually for the average household income. Today's average household income is $20,000 low-end and $200,000 high-end. Gas prices has gone from .24 cents a gallon in 1957 to nearly $3.00 a gallon in 2007. Milk in 2007 will cost you around $3.50 a gallon compared to $1.00 a gallon in 1957. You could purchase a car for $2,000 in 1957. Today a car can cost between $20,000 and $150,000. The cost of living to the annual income of 1957 averages out to be about the same as todays prices. As the cost of living goes up, the annual salary goes up as well.

To look back on 1957, America has a lot of advantages that it did not have back then. In 1957, there were only 471 television stations; today there are over 1,000. In 1957, there were only 1,000 computers sold, none of which had windows operating system. There were only 400 thousand telephone lines in use, and today there are over 268 million. There were only about 200 cell phones in use during 1957. There are 219 million Americans with cellphones today. There were only 8 airports, a big difference to todays 14,000 airports. Another advantage American's have today that we did not have in 1957 is much more education. We have more schools and universities than any other country. America's unemployment rate has slightly declined over the last fifty years; although, the rate of poverty has risen due to the population growth.

America in 2007 compared to 1957, has several advantages of over population as well as several disadvantages. America is a free country and has come a long way over the last fifty years.