Ya know I see your point about the Hummers and SUV'S on one side of the town and broken down crack addicts on the other. But you and others in society created this situation. The hip hop, rock star, baseball players, football players that are driving around in those Hummers are getting their money from you and me that pay them for their talents. I for one think their talents don?t warrant such incomes but I didn?t set the bar. If you don?t like seeing them driving around quit buying their products. Or go out, create your own rock band and get your own Humvee.
I agree with the"what can I do" bit, and so I do. I live off of less then $300 a month, and thats just for the basic bills of rent/ power/ phone. My food mostly comes from dumpsters, I brew my booze from the barley, my clothes are either old or liberate from nameless department stores (though generally my clothes are wearable year round, so I don't need much). Books from the library or borrowed from amigos, salvaged bike, hitch hike for long trips etc etc. I'm a minimalist for personal and political reasons (though, of course, there is awlays room for improvement). It is, it some sense, by the actions of those 'below' them that folks are proped up into positions of excess, but those positions existed well before the modern economy. And we must not ignore the power of influence wielded by those same people (I'll say brainwashing just to be simple about it, but I can't think of a more appropriate single word right now...coercion, misdirection, diabolical tickery).
Think back to "Come to my castle and buy only my goods or I'll send pirates to pillage and destroy you" days. The modern power dynamic is a product of its past, and there has always been the privileged very few exploiting the simple wants/needs of the majority. I'm not advocating Marxism, or that we should kill Poodles because they're bourgeois, so lets cut that out right now.
I believe that governments are the tools of the wealthy and protect their interests above all. The wealthy of this era have learned the follies of out right/ blatant oppression; if you don't toss em a bone from time to time that the dogs will bite your hand off (or in the case of the French, chop you're head off). Social programs, to which ever degree, serve this end. They allow the the dime-for-a-dollar's-work scheme to to carry on, with those who just want friends, family, and happiness being crushed under the clever who want to dominate and build excess. Both of these personality types are a product of our society, and we will, so long as 'civilization' exists, have to try and curb the amount of destruction inflicted by our peers, this approach is short sighted however and doomed to constantly sew self inflicted wounds. But, folks are 'free individuals' and have no sense of social responsibility. This can largely be attributed to deliberate mis-information and lack of exposure to alternatives. For many, the idea of brewing your own booze or hitching or being vegetarian or not having a TV or having a good time at home or outside instead of downtown is completely alien. Ignorance, as it extends into lack of experience, is a hard barrier to break, especially when there are folks singing silly defeatist gospels like "Those who promised us heaven, only ever brought us only ****". Again,I got lucky in being exposed to alternatives ("A simple way of life that don't make you a loser" as The Ditty Bops have said)
There is a lot of arguments to be made on matters of economy and government policy but, though perhaps admirable intentions exist, they all take the treatment approach rather then addressing the core of the problem; government, conventional civilization, large-scale capitalism. All of which are dependent, propped up like rock-stars, on the problems and exploitation that the people within are trying to address.