The Occupy movements that emerged in late 2011 were widely criticized for lacking coherent purpose. The next summer, we interviewed Occupy protesters in person and analyzed media coverage of events from California to Wall Street; we found the following set of concerns shared by the majority of Occupy participants:
- Economic challenges affecting equal opportunity
- Housing market collapse
- Corrupt financial institutions
- Swelling national debt
- Persistently high unemployment - Health care issues
- The human right to health care
- Spiraling costs
- Availability of health insurance - Human impact on the environment
- Habitat loss
- Climate change - Deteriorating quality of public education
- Urban challenges
- Homelessness
- Inadequate public transportation
- Violent crime - Dysfunctional government
- Partisan politics and legislative gridlock
- Campaign financing and the power of money
- Excessive influence of lobbyists
Additional issues important to many include: animal rights, foreign policy, immigration reform, same sex marriage and women’s reproductive rights.
It’s up to all of us – NOW!
Occupation USA is everyone’s job, as we all live here. Our government has reached a dysfunctional state which, if not remedied, may lead to catastrophic consequences for the country as well as the rest of the world.
We encourage you to consider the facts and join us in the discussion of how we, the people, can identify and affect the positive changes needed to get our country back on track. Please contribute your thoughts the blogs accessible from the left column (at the bottom of your iPad), or send a message to the email address on our About page.
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