AMERICAN NOTES: Bowery Barometer

The dismal science of economics has no more grim indicator of what is happening in the nation than the number of men who are forced to find refuge, as best they can, in the squalor of Manhattan's Bowery. This week the city-operated Men's Shelter in the slum will give Thanksgiving dinners to some 2,000 people, an increase of more than 50% over 1973's figure. The number who are seeking out the shelter day to day is up 22% in a year's time and includes the largest group of young men seen on the Bowery in decades.

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