#20 Since the beginning of 2009, the average price of a gallon of gasoline in the United States has increased by more than90 percent.

#21 The number of children living in poverty in the state of California has increased by 30 percent since 2007.

#22 Back in the year 2000, 11.3% of all Americans were living in poverty.  Today, 15.1% of all Americans are living in poverty.

#23 In November 2008, 30.8 million Americans were on food stamps.  Today, 46.5 million Americans are on food stamps.

#24 The U.S. dollar has lost 96.2 percent of its value since 1900.  You can thank the Federal Reserve system for that.

#25 In 1950, the United States was #1 in GDP per capita.  Today, the United States is #13 in GDP per capita.

#26 According to the U.S. Census Bureau, 49 percent of all Americans live in a home that receives direct monetary benefits from the federal government.  Back in 1983, less than a third of all Americans lived in a home that received direct monetary benefits from the federal government.

#27 In 1980, government transfer payments accounted for just 11.7% of all income.  Today, government transfer payments account for more than 18 percent of all income.

#28 Federal housing assistance increased by a whopping 42 percent between 2006 and 2010.

#29 Medicare spending increased by 138 percent between 1999 and 2010.

#30 Back in 1990, the federal government accounted for 32 percent of all health care spending in America.  Today, that figure is up to 45 percent and it is projected to surpass 50 percent very shortly.

#31 Back in 1965, only one out of every 50 Americans was on Medicaid.  Today, one out of every 6 Americans is on Medicaid, and things are about to get a whole lot worse.  It is being projected that Obamacare will add 16 million more Americans to the Medicaid rolls.

#32 Right now, spending by the federal government accounts for about 24 percent of GDP.  Back in 2001, it accounted for just 18 percent.

#33 In 2004, the U.S. government had a budget deficit of a little over 412 billion dollars.  This year, the U.S. government will run a budget deficit of over 1.3 trillion dollars.

#34 In 2001, the U.S. national debt was less than 6 trillion dollars.  Today, it is over 15 trillion dollars and it is increasing by about 150 million dollars every single hour.

#35 The U.S. national debt is now more than 22 times larger than it was when Jimmy Carter became president.

Unfortunately, these shocking statistics just don’t fully capture the horrible pain that many American families are having to endure in this economy.

A recent USA Today article told the sad story of one unemployed American named Jerome Greene….

Greene, about to turn 50, worked for 16 years as an Oracle software developer, most recently at a Pennsylvania company that made electronic components for cars. When he was laid off in June 2008, the recession was just taking hold, and he still had job interviews. By fall, with the economy in free fall, his phone stopped ringing.

Greene hoped the downturn would be brief and he’d weather it with unemployment benefits.

But the jobless rate hovered above 9% and Greene’s 99 weeks of unemployment expired. He had trouble sleeping. Depression set in. Without health insurance, he took precautions — carrying hand sanitizer and his own pen when doing errands to avoid getting sick and having to pay $65 for a doctor’s visit.

“There’s no room for error,” he says “There’s no extra money.”

Can you imagine going through all that?

Tonight there are millions upon millions of Americans that will struggle to get to sleep as they wrestle with their financial problems.  It is easy to feel as though you have failed when you can’t get a job and can’t provide for your children.  After years of fighting to turn things around, it is hard not to fall into a state of depression.