This week on NOW - NOW Friday, April 8, 2005 on PBS

[Guest guest]

NOW Friday, April 8, 2005 on PBS

 

 

" NOW-Update " <NOW-Update

Thu, 7 Apr 2005 17:24:39 -0400

 

 

This week on NOW

 

NOW Friday, April 8, 2005 on PBS

(Check local listings at http://www.pbs.org/now/sched.html)

 

This week on NOW:

*Social insecurity? Does social security reform mean more risks for

working Americans? David Brancaccio reports in RISKY BUSINESS.

 

 

 

RISKY BUSINESS

 

Americans from the working poor to the traditionally affluent are living

closer to the economic edge. One indicator is the growing swings in

income from year to year that have put some families on a roller coaster

and left them vulnerable to financial disaster. What's causing this new

economic insecurity and what does it say about the level of financial

risk assumed by average Americans? NOW profiles two families dealing

with the downside of this new economic reality. One of the families,

the Ryans from Wilmore, Kentucky, has lived through financial ups and

downs during the last two decades. Their story serves as a cautionary

tale for America's middle class. John Ryan, formerly a corporate lawyer

now working at the University of Kentucky, has had eight jobs in the

past decade-years of work, followed by lay-offs from downsizing. " When

I meet someone who's lost a job...it breaks my heart all over again to

think that they may have to go through the same challenges, " says Ryan.

In the report, David Brancaccio and LOS ANGELES TIMES national economics

correspondent Peter Gosselin analyze a thirty-year pattern of cuts to

benefits and worker protections that has shifted financial risks from

government and business onto average Americans.

 

(Check local listings at http://www.pbs.org/now/sched.html)