Los Angeles did not lack places to hide, because this prosperous city in the eyes of many outsiders also had slums.
The lives of the residents in the slums were not even as good as those in the poor counties in Hua Xia.
Experts from the World Bank had concluded that the fastest income growth in the American Empire over the past few decades was still the one percent of the population that was originally rich, while the poorest five percent of the population did not see any change in income.
The median income of the rich had greatly increased in recent decades, but the serious imbalance had become more and more obvious. The eight percent of the world's population received 50 percent of the world's income. Obviously, most people were outside of the eight percent …
Of course, the eight percent were the world's elites, financial and corporate executives in rich countries, and a large number of emerging middle class in Hua Xia, India, Brazil, and other countries.
The people living in Africa, Latin America, Eastern Europe, and the former Soviet Union did not see much change in income over the past few decades.
The people in the slums of the developed countries did not see any change at all!
The American Empire was actually a negative example because in many aspects, the American Empire often led the world and made other countries follow its footsteps. If other countries copied the American Empire, the future would not be optimistic.
The increasing income and wealth gap in the American Empire represented the situation in the Western world, and this trend became more common in the late 1980s! In most developed economies, the top few percent of people with the highest income earned more, while the bottom 20 percent fell further behind!
The slums of the developed countries were the best evidence of reality.
Xu Yun drove to look for the slums of the American Empire. These places were actually easy to find. After ten minutes of driving at a very fast speed, he saw a sign in one of the blocks.
The sign said: Do you dare — Seize the opportunity, follow your dreams, take risks, fall in love, believe in yourself, ask questions, let go, make mistakes, start over, tell the truth, be responsible, find happiness, live in the moment?
This was obviously something that only existed in the slums of Los Angeles. The rich did not need such toxic "chicken soup for the soul" at all.
Among the developed economies in the world, the American Empire had the most extreme income and opportunity gap, and this gap caused fatal consequences in the macroeconomic field.
To put it bluntly, in the past 40 years, the GDP of the American Empire had increased by more than four times, and in the past 20 years, it had almost doubled!
However, everyone knew that the benefits belonged to the people with the highest incomes. Moreover, the benefits were increasingly concentrated among the wealthiest people with the highest incomes! The poor were poor forty years ago, and they were still poor today!
Income inequality in the US Empire had been gradually increasing, accompanied by tax cuts for the rich and lax regulation of financial institutions.
This was not a coincidence! As investments in infrastructure, education, health care, and social safety nets were cut, this inequality worsened. The rising inequality eroded the political system and democratic governance of the United States, which then exacerbated the inequality.
In the slums of Los Angeles, you could see people looking for food in the garbage, homeless people lying in the sunlight, poor people pushing all their belongings in small carts, and slogans saying "God Loves You" could be seen everywhere, because this seemed to be their only spiritual food …
The United States did not lack all kinds of aid, but these people could only get a mouthful of food to fill their stomachs.
Xu Yun drove the car into a poor neighborhood. The legendary battle pet warrior in the car sat up in fright. "Why did we come to a place like this? This was the slum! This place is very dangerous! It's very unsafe! "
"Because it's not safe, it's easy for the police to 'miss' this place." Xu Yun said calmly. Of course, he knew how unsafe this place was.
"You don't understand the slums of the United States!" The Legend glared. "There are only all kinds of drug dealers here! Pimps! Prostitutes! There's only filth and chaos here! There's only murder and robbery! "
This was the black slum area in the west of Los Angeles, also known as the gangster area by the locals. In fact, it was not far from the bustling city center.
Just as the Legend expressed his concern, a few black figures appeared in front of the car. They walked directly toward the car without any intention of avoiding it.
Lin Ge said calmly, "Five black men."
"Such a blatant robbery. They really don't want to live …" Xu Yun shook his head helplessly. If they dared to block such a big car, one could imagine that these people would have pounced on them directly if they had encountered a car.
When Xu Yun stopped the car, the black men who blocked the car began to hit the car frantically.
These people had no intention of stopping after forcing Xu Yun's car to stop. It seemed that they had no intention of leaving until they got some benefits from Xu Yun and the Legend.
The Legend was so scared that he curled up into a ball. Xu Yun knew that coming to such a place would make the Legend feel a lot of fear. Even if he was kicked out of the car, the Legend would not agree.
Xu Yun and Lin Ge stood up and opened the car door. Xu Yun smelled a sour stench in the air.
Both sides of the street were filled with garbage. There was some napalm on the road. There were even groups of crushed cockroaches exposed to the air.
Xu Yun suddenly remembered that when he was on a mission in Detroit, there was also a sour stench like this on the street. Then, a truck suddenly drove over from the intersection and stopped beside a group of black men.
The black men around them came over to take a look. The people in the truck threw out a lot of clothes. They were all old and emitted a foul stench.
Xu Yun knew that these clothes were from the hospital or the crematorium. However, the people who received the clothes were still very happy. They did not even wash them and immediately put them on.
These people did not have a place to live or a job, so they did not mind anything. As long as it was given to them, they would accept it without hesitation.
They had no dreams, no ambitions, and no goals. They only had one thought, and that was to live.
After all, there were many black men in the United States. However, how many of them could become sports superstars? Many people played basketball from a young age. However, professional basketball in the United States required not only physical fitness and basketball sense, but also basketball IQ.
To put it bluntly, there were many people who were good at basketball in the United States. It was not that there were no people who could beat professional basketball superstars. However, if they did not have enough IQ, they would not be able to make it. After all, basketball was not a one-man game. It was a five-man team game.
It was the same in other sports, such as football, baseball, ice hockey …
All in all, although there were many ways to go about sports, there were still very few people who wanted to be outstanding.
Other than playing sports, their other way out was to be in movies and music. Black people were also very talented in music. Their sense of music was very strong. Even people who did not have any musical foundation could rely on their natural sense of music to make records.
Those gibberish rap songs made many black singers. The trendy Master Kan was such a genius. He could make the so-called rap routine full of changes and competitiveness. However, such people were also very few.
Therefore, most black people still lived in poverty. At this moment, the five people standing in front of Xu Yun and the others were examples. How bad their lives were was perhaps something that Xu Yun and Lin Ge could not imagine.
Xu Yun stepped on the huge pickup and raised his eyebrows as he asked the five people in front of him, "Hey, brothers, what do you want?"
When the five black men saw that they were Chinese, they did not hesitate to take out the switchblade hidden on their bodies. "Cut the crap! Take out all the cash you have right now! "
"What era is this? Who still uses cash?" Lin Ge laughed at them from behind. "In this day and age, we all use mobile payments. Do you have WeChat? I'll send you a red packet. Alipay is fine too. I'll transfer it to you. We don't have cash. "
The other party did not understand what Lin Ge said at all. They thought that he was laughing at them and immediately turned hostile. "Believe it or not, I'll kill you right now!"
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