Supporting the Working Poor

Labor Day weekend is coming up and along with it dreams of getting away for an extra long weekend with few worries or cares to burden us. For many, many people in this country, however, lack of employment and low wages are constant concerns, taking their toll on families everywhere and preventing them from enjoying a holiday that is truly care-free.

Of course, the causes of this problem are complex and multifaceted, but it is pretty clear that one of the strategies at our disposal that could help a great deal in reducing the plight of the working poor is to raise the minimum wage. The federal minimum wage is currently $7.25 an hour, somewhat higher in some states and localities, but this is what prevails in most places. For a 40-hour work week, a $7.25 an hour wage translates to $290 a week or $14,500 a year. You can perhaps skimp by on this as an individual, depending on where you live, but this is tantamount to poverty wages for a family of 2 or more. It just isn't sustainable without extra support and a generous allocation from SNAP (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program), better known as Food Stamps. In fact, we know more confidently than ever that the best ways to fight poverty and hunger are to raise the minimum wage and to fully fund SNAP. Yet it often seems we are moving in the opposite direction, as if it were the fault of the people who work so hard for a living despite their ability to command a living wage.

We hear often about the problem with raising the minimum wage, how it can actually depress employment and undermine economic growth, but it turns out that the evidence for this is surprisingly slim. Moreover, don't we owe it to people who work incredibly hard in fast food restaurants and Walmarts to be able to count on a salary that allows them to live at least somewhat reasonably? Having a decent apartment, relatively unworn clothing, and nutritious, healthy food is hardly a lot to ask. But even these things are impossible without a greatly increased minimum wage.

This tendency to defend policies that make a few people rich, while hoping ingenuously that somehow the wealth created will trickle down to benefit everyone, seems on the face of it to be absurd. There just isn't any evidence that it works even for the middle income worker. The evidence for trickle down is still flimsier for the working poor. So why do we cling to it?

Primarily because we simply don't care about poor people. We want them as far removed from our lives as possible and thus, because they are so detached from our everyday realities, their welfare becomes quite irrelevant to our own well being. They just don't matter to us. How do we make them matter?

Through stories, I think, of what it is like to be a worker who works hard but remains poor. A few years ago, the fine journalist and New Yorker editor, David Shipler, wrote a book called "Working Poor: Invisible in America" in which he recounts the stories of people who are struggling to make ends meet but who nevertheless work long hours and are, in fact, reliable, loyal workers.

Here are the words Shipler uses to introduce his book: "The man who washes cars does not own one. The clerk who files cancelled checks at the bank has $2.02 in her own account. The woman who copyedits medical textbooks has not been to a dentist in a decade."

"This is the forgotten America. At the bottom of its working world, millions live in the shadow of prosperity, in the twilight between poverty and well-being."

Note the subtitle, by the way. Like many people of color, the working poor are invisible, forgotten, neglected, not people to be concerned about. They help us to do all the things that make our better remunerated work possible, but they are, for the most part, ignored, left behind, and really kind of looked down upon. And, amazingly, I don't think they mind this treatment all that much. But when it comes to having enough to eat, being able to afford seeing the doctor when necessary, enjoying a decent roof over their heads, they do expect some kind of minimum that allows a decent existence. But again, the invisibility theme helps to explain why this doesn't happen. Bringing attention to the plight of the working poor is the first step. Maybe we can start this Labor Day. It is about labor, but fairly compensated labor that respects workers as humans, family breadwinners, and important contributors to our public good.