Deb Gauthier: Poverty and racism
Furor grows over the issue of race in this presidential election - the spiritual adviser to black presidential candidate Barack Obama has preached in anger against the United States and Obama's wife says she had no pride in this country until her husband's candidacy.
From those comments: Praise from the black community; outrage from the white.
It's all about race.
Except it isn't, not really. The real issue, as it has been for tens of tens of years, is opportunity and education, the lack of which forms the bedrock of poverty. Poverty affects more blacks and hispanics than whites, but regardless the color of skin, the long-term effects of poverty is disastrous, not just for the individual, but for family, community and country.
Some will say it's outrageous for a white, middle-class woman with a decent job to presume to know the problems of poor families. I will say I speak from experience.
My father was a woolen mill worker at a time when woolen mills in New England were dying. He earned little and was often unemployed. He and my mother, a devout Catholic, did not practice birth control. I am the oldest of eight children.
According to my mother, I was the "smartest" of her brood. I most certainly was the most bookish of the bunch. Now and then, she'd mention college, but that mention never became a discussion. There were no discussions in my childhood home. Everyone was too busy trying to survive - another layoff, another pregnancy, another miscarriage, another baby, another move to a new apartment, to a new community.
I had no real hope for a college education, and toward the end of my senior year in high school sealed that fate by doing what hundreds of thousands of poor, young women do regardless of race - I became pregnant; married; had one child, then two. I worked, for a short time, in the same mill as my father and husband.
My life, were it not for opportunity, would be much different today. An English teacher and a caring, supportive husband helped pull me up from a life of poverty. Our children went to college, their children will most likely do the same.
For me, the cycle is broken.
But for far too many people in this country, the cycle continues, generation after generation. More than 36.5 million people in this rich country live in poverty, defined by Senator Charles E. Schumer's Joint Economic Committee Fact Sheet as a family of four with an income of $20,614.
Costs have skyrocketed, yet the poverty level, the line at which government benefits become available, remain at 1955 levels. John E. Schwarz, in the Sept. 18, 2007 edition of Newsday, writes that the poverty line today, if it were factored properly, would be $34,000 for a family of four. (Bear in mind that a family with two adults working full-time at the average minimum wage of $6 per hour will earn a combined $23,000).
In addition, federal programs designed to lift low-income families out of poverty are cut each year. Says Schumer: "...Although the number of children living in poverty has increased by 11 percent since 2000, the number of children receiving Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) has moved in the opposite direction, declining by 22.2 percent over the same period."
Where will those children be in 20 years? It is safe to say, particularly given the escalating cost of a college education, that the majority will struggle from week to week at a minimum-wage job, just as my parents did. They will offer little hope to their children for a better life.
And while hundreds of millions of people struggle for survival, a privileged few watch their immense wealth grow through perverted tax laws and lax business regulation.
The poor in this country have a right to be angry, and the disappearing middle class should share in that anger as the chasm between the rich and poor widens.
Anger over inequality founded this country. Today, breaking the cycle of poverty may be all that can save it.
Deborah E. Gauthier can be reached at dgauthie@cnc.com.