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Hello and welcome to assignment on the BBC World Service.

I'm Hilary Anderson and this week's program is about poverty in the richest country in the world.

We visit America's Underworlds starting in a storm drain tunnel

underneath the heartbeat of capitalism, the glitzy casinos of Las Vegas, Nevada.

The palms, the Rio has the voodoo lounge up top on a rooftop.

Casino and they have rooftop clubs can't blame them for coming to Vegas to enjoy this weather here.

We get to hear everything down here.

Where hundreds of America's poorest are living.

What do you miss about your previous lives?

You take for granted the convenience is of power, of hot water,

a fruit durator to keep food well.

Because you know, she's a great cook.

I love to cook as well.

We went deep underground into the dark labyrinth of tunnels that runs under Las Vegas.

It was dirty, silent and eerie.

Here we met Ned, a clean cut man in his thirties.

Dressed in a pristine white shirt, he lives down here with his girlfriend, Danielle.

Her face looks drawn.

The couple would have been considered to be middle class Americans not long ago.

...