> but struggle to feed themselves
Wealth means assets. If you can't feed yourself you do not have assets and therefore you don't have wealth.
There is extreme lack of poverty in the U.S. (not complete, and compared to all countries). There is no reason for anyone to go without food.
I'm not sure which US you're referring to but it's not one I recognise. There is massive inequality in the US that I know and the results of that are visible everywhere that I visited. Homeless people abound like nowhere else in the developed western world that I've been to (Europe, Australia) and there is a real edge of desperation to the countless number of working poor. For example, in my experience, money is a topic of conversation that pops up way more frequently in the US than elsewhere. If it's not in the context of income (usually being too low) then it's about prices and taxes (usually being too high). Americans seem to think about these things A LOT. Also, looking around, it seems to me like everyone is always hustling for the next dollar. It's sufficiently weird and alien to me that I find it remarkable.
I'm from an African country and with that perspective I stand by this phrase:
> There is extreme lack of poverty in the U.S. There is no reason for anyone to go without food.
Name one area in the U.S. where a homeless person cannot get a meal.
My claim is simple. The U.S. is the most prosperous place on the planet, the inequality doesn't touch at least a hundred other countries. Again, inequality isn't necessarily an indicator of poverty.
The comparisons you make are on absolute terms but the reality is more nuanced. There are almost 47 million people living in poverty in the US [1] and something like 38% of the population live paycheque-to-paycheque (up from 31% in the late 90s) [2]. Even if most of those people are food-secure (something like 90% of Americans in poverty are) those numbers should still be pretty alarming. Just because the average American has it much better than the average African doesn't mean their situation is necessarily very good.
[1] http://www.census.gov/hhes/www/poverty/about/overview/index....
[2] http://www.cbsnews.com/news/more-americans-live-paycheck-to-...
In my experience that's because Americans only talk about personal wealth/income by proxy. They won't talk about how much they earn, but they will talk about how much they pay for rent, or talk about taxes, etc.
It's a way to gauge how much the people you know are making in a system where the concept of pay grade doesn't exist across companies.
If you can feed yourself by going into debt, then you have purchasing power. You need something (except if you're a student) to guarantee the loan.
