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Russ Whitney’s claim that 87% of seniors live at or below the poverty line by John T. Reed

In his infomercial, Russ Whitney says, “You know it’s hard to believe that 87% of the public will retire at or below the poverty level with less than $12,000 a year in income.”
Yes, that is hard to believe—because it’s not true.
Is Whitney deliberately lying? I don’t know.
If he keeps running that informercial with that line in it after he reads this article he will be lying.
The Census Bureau is the expert on poverty and who is in it. Here’s what they say about it.
“The percentage of people 65 and over living in poverty in 2002 was 10.1%. The poverty rate for 65 and older was indistinguishable from the poverty rate for 18 to 64 year olds.” (http://www.census.gov/hhes/poverty/poverty02/pov02hi.html)
“The 2001 median 65 and over income was $23,118 in 2001 dollars.” (http://www.census.gov/hhes/income/histinc/h10.html)
“The poverty threshold in 2002 was $8,628 for a one-person household and $10,885 for a two-person household.” (http://www.census.gov/hhes/poverty/threshld/thresh02.html)
Here is what USA Today had to say about senior net worths.
“According to the Federal Reserve Board’s most recent Survey of Consumer Finances, households headed by people age 65-74 have the highest median net worth of any age group in the country—$146,500. The average net worth for this age group, $465,500, is higher than that for all age groups except the 55-64 crowd. For those households headed by someone age 75 or older, the median and average net worth figures surpass those for households headed by Americans younger than 35 and those headed by people 35-44. In the period 1995-1998, the median net worth for American households headed by people 65 and older increased by 20% after inflation.” (http://www.usatoday.com/news/opinion/columnists/freeman/ncjf90.htm)
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Copyright 2004 by John T. Reed
Last update 5/12/04
John T. Reed, a.k.a. John Reed, Jack Reed, 342 Bryan Drive, Alamo, CA 94507, Voice: 925-820-7262, Fax: 925-820-1259, Email: johnreed@johntreed.com

CONSUMER WARNING NOTICE: I recently saw Russ Whitney on a late night TV infomercial and then attended one of his "free" seminars. Unfortunately I believed all of their LIES and FRAUDULENT CLAIMS and I paid thousands of dollars to go to his "training camps". Needless to say I was clearly ripped off, cheated and lied to by Russ Whitney and his employees (band of thieves). My mistake was not searching the Internet to find out more about Russ Whitney and his company's HORRIBLE reputation for fraud, deception and illegal activities. Had I searched online I would have found out about THOUSANDS of customers being cheated, HUNDREDS of investigations by the Attorney General into the fraud of Russ Whitney and his company's, and that Russ Whitney himself is a CONVICTED VIOLENT FELON and spent years in PRISON. I saved the cached pages from the major search engines of the John Reed lawsuit with Russell Whitney and the TRUTH and FACTS that Reed discovered during his investigation of Whitney. I am posting this information on real estate discussion boards so other people do NOT get cheated and ripped off like I did.