Nearly 500 protesters were arrested in three dozen US cities on Thursday as fast-food workers and supporters staged sit-ins and acts of civil disobedience nationwide to call attention to their low wages and lack of union representation. Organizers of the strike said that, all told, actions at fast-food restaurants occurred at about 150 cities nationwide, from Manhattan’s Times Square to Littl [...]

One person dies as a result of suicide every 40 seconds, according to a new World Health Organization report released on Thursday, citing economic factors and noting that three times as many men as women kill themselves. “Suicide is an amazing public health problem. There is one suicide every 40 seconds -- it is a huge number,” said Shekhar Saxena, director of WHO's mental health department [...]

Evidence of America's widening wealth gap since the 2007 financial crisis show that the bottom tier of US income earners is falling rapidly behind on the nutrition front. Meanwhile, the diets of higher wage earners are also sub-par. Despite government efforts to promote nutritional awareness, a 12-year study shows that eating habits in the United States remain a national concern. [...]

Around 110 million Americans are now receiving welfare benefits, including food stamps, Medicaid and subsidized housing. This has prompted calls to raise the minimum wage to $10.10 an hour. A third of Americans are now on welfare benefits, prompting calls to raise the minimum wage and encourage more people to stay in work. [...]

A New Jersey woman who worked four jobs, who sometimes "wouldn't sleep for five days," according to a co-worker, died Monday while napping between shifts in her car on the side of the road. Maria Fernandes died in her 2001 Kia Sportage after inhaling carbon monoxide and fumes from an overturned gas container she kept in the car, according to the New York Daily News. [...]

Inequality between the richest and poorest metropolitan areas in the US is at its highest since 1969, and could hamper the recovery of the housing market that was at the heart of the 2008 financial crisis. A report by the US Commerce and Labor Department shows that when analyzing the largest 100 metropolitan areas in the country, the disparity between the 10th most affluent region and the 90th [...]

The Albuquerque Police Department in the state of New Mexico is coming under fire following the release of video footage taken from the helmet-mounted camera of an officer who shot and killed a man earlier this month for camping. James Boyd, a 38-year-old homeless man thought to be schizophrenic, was shot by the Albuquerque PD on Sunday, March 16 after he became engaged in an hours-long standoff w [...]

Cuts average 25.3% in 10 most deprived areas of England, and 2.54% in 10 least deprived areas. The most deprived communities in the country are bearing the brunt of government cuts while more affluent areas are escaping relatively unscathed, according to an analysis of official figures. [...]

Roughly 40 percent of New York City’s military veterans are finding themselves facing hunger with few options for help, and the problem may be get worse in the future. According to Margarette Purvis, the president and CEO of the Food Bank for New York City, about 95,000 veterans need food aid such as those offered by soup kitchens and other hunger-relief organizations. [...]

Four out of 5 U.S. adults struggle with joblessness, near poverty or reliance on welfare for at least parts of their lives, a sign of deteriorating economic security and an elusive American dream. Survey data exclusive to The Associated Press points to an increasingly globalized U.S. economy, the widening gap between rich and poor and loss of good-paying manufacturing jobs as reasons for the trend [...]