We all hope this isn’t a sign of things to come, except that it’s already here.
I picked this up from a post by Dave Neiwert at Firedoglake. (You need to read the whole story at CNN.) It’s about homeless middle class women [Note: see comments] in Santa Barbara, California, sleeping in their cars:
Harvey now works part time for $8 an hour, and she draws Social Security to help make ends meet. But she still cannot afford an apartment, and so every night she pulls into a gated parking lot to sleep in her car, along with other women who find themselves in a similar predicament.
There are 12 parking lots across Santa Barbara that have been set up to accommodate the growing middle-class homelessness. These lots are believed to be part of the first program of its kind in the United States, according to organizers.
The lots open at 7 p.m. and close at 7 a.m. and are run by New Beginnings Counseling Center, a homeless outreach organization.
It is illegal for people in California to sleep in their cars on streets. New Beginnings worked with the city to allow the parking lots as a safe place for the homeless to sleep in their vehicles without being harassed by people on the streets or ticketed by police.
These aren’t crazies pushing shopping carts full of junk. These are people like you and me who fell on hard times and don’t have spouses, families, or government agencies to take care of them. Too poor to afford rent and too “well off” to qualify for assistance (assuming there is any), they sleep in their cars in parking lots set aside for them in one of the richest, poshest communities in California. Author Neiwert suggests calling these lots “Bushvilles,” after the infamous “Hoovervilles” of the Great Depression era.
What happens to your job when gas hits $10/gallon, and if you still have a car, where will you park to sleep?
Nice little country we got here. Holy Mother of God…
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At risk of sounding atrocious, which is not my intention…I’m not sure one could define $8/hr part time as “middle class” in California. That wouldn’t even pay rent in most neighborhoods of Santa Barbara that aren’t slum.
This is why I take issue both with federal standards for poverty and with generic statements like “middle class” – the realities of most localities are so completely offbase from blanket statements that large as to be meaningless.
Which isn’t to say I don’t sympathize with her and don’t agree this is a sign of how far we’ve fallen as a country. We’ve certainly lost sight of what SHOULD be the primary function of a government, which is to freaking well take care of its constituents. But my rent controlled apartment is going for just under $1200 a month in a building that now starts at $1525. Even full time, $8/hr doesn’t even gross that much before taxes. That ain’t middle class here.
I concede your point, and thanks for making it. Damned if I know what “middle class” is, anyway. My wife and I pay almost $1,000/mo. for housing, drive a NEW CAR strictly on the strength of her credit rating, have five college degrees between us, and didn’t make enough money last year to pay any taxes!
But no matter what we call it, it’s fucking terrible. I’ve never been so fed up with things in all my life. That ONLY 80-some percent of the American people think we’re moving in the wrong direction is a bloody miracle, IMHO.
Oh, and that article did say Ms. Harvey was getting Social Security. Depending on how much that is, she might very well meet somebody’s statistical standard for middle class. My wife and I would be roadkill without it, lemme tell ya.