American Poverty: Struggling to Stay Afloat

[Starry Messenger]

http://blackstarnews.com/news/135/ARTICLE/7973/2012-02-18.html

By Marian Wright Edelman

Levi Nation, age 12, and his sister Katherine, eight, eat Sunday dinners at their grandparents’ house in rural Kalkaska County, Michigan. They live with their parents, James and Lois, in an old trailer next door. Though both parents work, they can’t afford a better place—or health insurance or outings with the children. “Sometimes I wish we could go someplace like down to a water park or, like, the zoo,” Levi said.

At one time, the Nations owned a home. But like so many other American families, their standard of living has declined over the past decade even though they are a two-parent working family.

James’s family employment story echoes the Michigan story, as Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Julia Cass learned when she met the family while on assignment for the Children’s Defense Fund. His father worked for General Motors in Flint until it offered him “a golden handshake and he took the check,” James said. James considers himself a member of “probably the last generation to be able to walk out of high school and get a decent job,” though he and his brother came too late to find well-paying work at GM and move up into the middle class.

<snip>

Kalkaska and neighboring Grand Traverse County on Lake Michigan are, in part, resort areas with second homes and luxury condos. James started a handyman service and Lois had massage clients. “Then the economy kind of fell apart and I had to get a job to be sure the bills were paid,” James said. He worked as a mechanic at a farm equipment store for a few years and recently moved to a part-time job with the Village of Kalkaska as a wastewater operator. “It’s a little less money, but the commute is shorter, so it evens out,” James said. “Also, I’m hoping it will turn into a full-time job with benefits.” James earns $13 an hour and works 30 hours a week. He earns a little more than $19,000 a year.

[JNelson6563]

1. And I got 10 bucks says James and his whole family

vote Rethug. I know Kalkaska county well. Very rural, very poor, very red. I live in neighboring Grand Traverse county. They mistakenly lumped the two counties in th same place but Kalakaska has no draw, it's a pass through sort of county. Surely some cottages and such but very different from GT county. There is a city in Grand Traverse that serves as a draw for many counties, a large body of water as well as inland lakes. Lot more affluence as well as opportunity. They are very different from each other, how odd that the reporter so missed the mark on that.

Julie

[TBF]

2. The point of the story is to discuss poverty in this country -

not their voting habits. In this group we all understand that the media is owned by the 1% and we understand the fall out from that.

[limpyhobbler]

3. It's amazing how people can vote against their economic interests.

Even receiving food stamps and the Medicaid? I would hope this family would be voting to try to protect what little help they are actually getting from the government.

You bring up an interesting point that there is a lot more affluence in the next county over. So we can see it is not necessarily like the whole region is just one big sea of poverty, even though it may have been hit hard. Really there is some affluence in the area, but this family is clearly not sharing in the affluence.

I think maybe a serious government jobs program could help address some of the structural unemployment in America. Maybe something like a modern version of the WPA.

[JNelson6563]

5. It's very interesting really.

The geography does play a large part in it. As I mentioned Kalkaska county is more of a pass through place while GT county is a destination. Oddly there is a lot of oil and gas in Kalkaska but apparently not on enough properties to bring more widespread wealth.

Much of the money that comes into GT is brought from outside of the area. Because of Traverse City and Grand Traverse Bay many have summer homes there. By summer home I mean where the family spends the summer there while (usually) the dad goes to "the city" (often Chicago or Detroit area) to work during the week. In Kalkaska those are more like cottaqes in that the owners come for weekends and summer vacation.

Tourism is very important up here. The county that doesn't have festivals, an interesting city, sandy beaches or beautiful views won't get to cash in on that, even if visitors have to drive through to get to the actual attraction.

It is very sad though how right wing the county is. I am very good friends with the Dems in that county and know their story well. A sea of tea party folks swept in in 2010 at the county level. The Dems there have been working to get them recalled and have had some success. It's heartening but I don't get too excited that poor Kalkaska will stop voting against it's own interest any time soon. Lots of Confederate Flag decals on cars, Rush is Right! bumper stickers and the like. There is a very old commentary about Kalakaska that goes like this "Kalkaska is Alaksa with the KKK in it", Yeah, it's like that.

They vote down just about every public thing they can. Can't have that soshalizm stuff in Kalkaska County!

Julie

[TBF]

6. This is the socialist progressive group -

can you please explain in detail how poor folks in this country right now are voting "against their economic interests". Please be specific.

Obama is my candidate because he is (a) not a nut job (b) backs occasional progressive ideals - like the Lily Ledbetter Act (c) he can speak in public without embarrassing us

But "economic" interests - let's discuss this in detail - and I don't expect your response to be "Oh the repugs would be worse". I want to hear economic details with verifiable back-up.

[limpyhobbler]

7. ok cool I subscribed to the group

I had subscribed to it back during the switch to DU3 but haven't really posted much in the group

can you please explain in detail how poor folks in this country right now are voting "against their economic interests". Please be specific.

Sorry I didn't know that was going to be on the test.

LOL Just kidding. Another poster had mentioned she lived in the area and anecdotally Kalkaska County votes right-wing. I don't know how to tell for certain how people in a certain county are going to vote, especially when you break it down by income like that. Maybe you could try asking in the Politics 2012 forum? They might have that kind of info on details of elections, like all the polls and such.

But "economic" interests - let's discuss this in detail - and I don't expect your response to be "Oh the repugs would be worse".

One thing the article made me think about was how issues of unemployment, underemployment, poverty and inequality relate to structural changes in the US economy.

For example:

James considers himself a member of “probably the last generation to be able to walk out of high school and get a decent job,” though he and his brother came too late to find well-paying work at GM and move up into the middle class.

So we have this problem of workers being displaced as manufacturing jobs disappear. Often those would have been union jobs with better pay and benefits than anything available now. Sorry I don't have a chart or anything for the structural unemployment/poverty issue. But Joseph Stiglitz explained it pretty well.

The parallels between the story of the origin of the Great Depression and that of our Long Slump are strong. Back then we were moving from agriculture to manufacturing. Today we are moving from manufacturing to a service economy. The decline in manufacturing jobs has been dramatic—from about a third of the workforce 60 years ago to less than a tenth of it today. The pace has quickened markedly during the past decade. There are two reasons for the decline. One is greater productivity—the same dynamic that revolutionized agriculture and forced a majority of American farmers to look for work elsewhere. The other is globalization, which has sent millions of jobs overseas, to low-wage countries or those that have been investing more in infrastructure or technology. (As Greenwald has pointed out, most of the job loss in the 1990s was related to productivity increases, not to globalization.) Whatever the specific cause, the inevitable result is precisely the same as it was 80 years ago: a decline in income and jobs. The millions of jobless former factory workers once employed in cities such as Youngstown and Birmingham and Gary and Detroit are the modern-day equivalent of the Depression’s doomed farmers.

http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/2012/01/stiglitz-depression-201201

For anybody, would you agree that structural unemployment a major concern raised by the article by Marian Wright Edelman? If so, what are some things the government could do to help alleviate this type of unemployment?

I was thinking maybe we should have a serious government jobs program that would be similar to the WPA in the 1930s and 1940s, except updated for 21st century needs. The government could hire people to rebuild our country's physical infrastructure, modernize our internet systems and energy plant, prepare for emergencies, and whatever good things you can think of. What would you think of a jobs program like that? Would you support that?

Also I did notice that the mom in the story was working two part-time jobs and it sounded like the dad was working intermittently. That got me to thinking how it is a sad situation and how working class people are getting screwed. It seems like the middle class is disappearing and inequality between the wealthy and the poor is increasing. Working hard just does not pay off for a lot of people.

I want to hear economic details with verifiable back-up.

Is it for a school report or something? Maybe try the Bureau of Labor Statistics? Sorry I couldn't be of more assistance, I don't have any hard evidence off hand.

But I did find a few charts that demonstrate the increasing inequality in the US.

Inequality can be measured over time.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/08/14/income-inequality-is-at-a_n_259516.html

Compare inequality over time in the US vs. France:


Who gets paid:


US wages as a percentage of GDP (How much money goes to workers as opposed to corporations):


So it does seem this family's economic interest is wound up in these bigger issues. Structural economic changes have reduced the quality and quantity of manufacturing jobs in their region particularly. At the same time the working class and/or middle class has lost out everywhere in the US for at least the last 30 years or so. And it sounded like the family in the story had been hit pretty hard like a lot of us. But that's just one angle.

What was your take on it?

[TBF]

8. I know all about the inequality -

my point to you is that coming into the socialist group and blaming what you see on people "voting against their own interests" is misplaced. You have no way of knowing how this family votes, and none of your text or charts answers the question I asked you.

Voting is fine (and obviously when we look at cultural issues it is well worth our time), but it doesn't get at the underlying economic problems that we face with capitalism. Please read the SOP pinned at the top and there are quite a few articles to work your way through. Please ask if you have any questions. We do welcome socialist democrats here and that may be where you fit in - someone who would like a mixed economy like those of the Scandinavian countries. Just guessing because you brought up WPA style programs. It would be better than what we have now for sure.

Personally what I would like to see is a transition from capitalism to socialism - nationalization of all major industries to start with (energy, health care, banks). You'll find quite a wide range of thought in this forum, my personal perspective is that workers engaged in committees to run their own businesses, for example, would be better than the model we have now - a few old white guys owning & running everything. Bill Gates, for example, has more assets than 30% of the people in this country. Think about how crazy that is.

However we do it, I would prefer not to blame the workers for a situation they have very little control in (due to the system they are trapped in - not personal bad choices).

Does that make sense?

Thanks very much for your comments - I appreciate your perspective and the time you took to respond.

[Starry Messenger]

4. Marian Wright Edelman isn't a reporter.

She's a Civil Rights icon.

She was writing to make the point that white people also rely on the thin social safety net we have in this country to a greater extent than any other demographic. I don't think James' children vote Republican, so the "whole family" no, doesn't do that. I vote D and make under $30k. Voting one way or another doesn't guarantee a certain standard of living.