The average and median wage is around $60,000 in the US. Not $22,000 like you reported.
You do understand, during the great depression, kids actually walked along the side of the road picking up bits of tinfoil, hoping to get enough to get a few pennies so they could eat, because there was no food at home? And every single house had a garden, because they couldn't just get food stamps. Every person who survived this time was traumatized for the rest of their life by seeing one bite of food being thrown away.
I think you're reading a history book written by a USSR propagandist.
