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Have you ever considered what it is like to have no sources of income? In reality, this is relevant for millions of Americans however, the political debates rarely acknowledge this reality. When conversations about the poor occur in the city of Washington, they usually discuss the struggles of the working poor, forgetting about the issues that the non-working poor face day by day. The 2015 book $2.00 a Day: Living on Almost Nothing in America written by two renowned social scientists Kathryn J. Edin and H. Luke Shaefer looks into changing the trend.
For $2.00 a Day, Kathryn Edin and Luke Shaefer explored the lives and life experiences of the ones that are impoverished, ones that are only able to find, in the best case, a low-wage occupation. Their stories represent the struggles that were influenced by the unstable housing situations as well as racial discrimination. The authors pose an initial question explored in their book: “Who killed welfare?” (Edin and Shaefer 10).
Edin and Shaefer found that the life without welfare, a life filled with various deprivations is very unstable and complex, punishing in both physical and psychological aspects, and reliant on the small everyday events that may leave someone without work, food, or shelter. Finding work for these people is the most complicated task of their life. In order to interview for a job, a person needs to look presentable, which means having some clean clothes and an opportunity to bathe. Both of these aspects are quite problematic for a person that lives in a shelter. Unless the person who is looking for a job can walk to the interview, he or she needs some money for public transport or gas for the car. To receive a call from the interviewer, one needs to have a phone and so on. Thus, even being poor and homeless can be expensive.
In $2.00 a Day, readers are able to meet several people who live in poverty; however their real names were not mentioned for privacy reasons. The story of Modonna Harris from Chicago is as heartbreaking as others in the book. She had a diploma from high school and studied at college for two years along with having a child from an unsuccessful marriage. She had a full-time job at a music store that she was fired from. As a consequence, she was unable to pay her rent and was forced to move in with her relatives who were willing to shelter her and her daughter for a very short period of time. They had very little food, and their breakfast consisted of a cup of coffee with as much sugar and cream as the coup could physically hold.
When the poor described by Edin and Shaefer had no other choice apart from breaking the law, they did not hesitate. A woman would have her rent paid by a ‘friend’ in exchange for sexual services. Some may trade their food assistance stamps for cash that was considered a risky fraud punished by the federal sentencing guideline as severely as voluntary manslaughter, for instance.
Another important aspect explored in $2.00 a Day explains welfare changes that did have a positive impact for some people but forced others into poverty. For example, the 1996 Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Act signed by Bill Clinton promoted a welfare reform based on the shortage of cash assistance and promotion of getting a job. The poor population that was qualified for a job received the Earned Income Tax Credit while the ones that did not have a job and needed money the most were not longer able to receive any assistance from the government (Edin and Shaefer 17).
Despite the fact that the constant struggles of the ‘work of survival’ has not defeated ay person described in $2.00 a Day, when a teenager says that the never-ending hunger makes him “feel like you want to be dead”, it is impossible to be blind to poverty faced by millions of people (Edin and Shaefer 149). No matter how popular $2.00 a Day is, reading and writing about the issue is only good when it comes to spreading awareness that is not very helpful to those who live in poverty. Words are only a part of the help.
The true changes in society will happen when everyone stands together for the goal of making the lives of the poor better, providing them with the opportunity to get a descent job that will ensure that they have food on the table and a roof above their heads.
Thus, however the book written by Edin and Shaefer has changed the perception of the issue surrounding the poor, the rhetoric of the government should take a 360-turn. Instead of being concerned about those who have jobs but do not live their lives at fullest, it is important to address the issues of those people that are even unable to go to the job interview, let alone get the job.
Works Cited
Edin, Kathryn, and Luke Shaefer. $2 a Day: Living on Almost Nothing in America, New York, NY: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company, 2015. Print.
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