Poverty and Opportunity

The Brookings Institution recently released a 80 page report (PDF) titled, "From Poverty, Opportunity: Putting the Market to Work for Lower Income Families. From the executive summary:
"In general, lower income families tend to pay more or the exact same consumer products than families with higher incomes....At least 1.6 million lower income adults pay excessive fees for furniture, appliances, and electronics. And countless more pay high prices for other necessities such as basic financial services, groceries, and insurance....Reducing the costs of living for lower income families by just one percent could add up to over $6.5 billion in new spending power for these families."