By Mya Guarnieri
From Rick DeSantis, the Republican governor of my home state of Florida, to President Donald Trump, to the Instagram messages of Harry and Meghan, the duke and duchess of Sussex, to “Wonder Woman” star Gal Gadot, to some of my upper-middle class friends on Facebook, it’s become the catchphrase and sentiment of our moment, a reminder that the coronavirus is a great equalizer, a symbol of our shared humanity: We’re all in this together.
Only we’re not.
The coronavirus has been anything but a great equalizer. Rather, it’s been the great revealer, pulling the curtain back on the class divide, exposing how deeply unequal this country is and how deep the fissures are. Rather than trying to cover it all up with pithy sayings – rather than trying to sweep these divides under the rug with platitudes like “we’re all in this together” – we should use this moment as an opportunity to take a hard look at all the broken systems that perpetuate inequality: education, health coverage, distribution of opportunity and wealth, to name a few.
I’m a low-income mother of two children ages 2 and 4. My husband manages a small cellphone store; before I went back to university in the fall to pick up a second master’s degree, I was an adjunct professor. We are on food stamps and Medicaid. These days, as many of my friends and acquaintances continue working in white-collar jobs while sheltering at home, my husband must continue opening his store every day. If he doesn’t, he won’t get paid. If he doesn’t get paid, we won’t make rent. And I doubt the French investors who own our townhouse in South Florida will care enough about our particular circumstances to let us stay here free.
In our income bracket, this experience is common. While many upper-middle class and wealthy families stay home together and stay healthy, people like my husband must go out and risk their lives – and the lives of the loved ones they come home to – by working low-paying service jobs that require a high degree of contact with the public.
Already, statistics show low-income communities are bearing the brunt of this epidemic: In New York, the nation’s coronavirus epicenter, the least well-off neighborhoods are hit the hardest; South Florida is the center of the state’s covid crisis. Writing in CityLab, urbanist Richard Florida teamed up with economist Todd Gabe to examine the class divide and identify “the cities and metro areas whose workforces are most exposed and at risk from Covid-19.” They zoomed in on two factors or “two key at-risk characteristics of jobs: the degree to which workers interact directly with the public and jobs that require high levels of very close physical proximity to others.”
Guess what they found? We’re not all in this together.
“Three-quarters of the jobs that involve working directly with the public are low-paying service jobs; 70% of the people who work in close physical proximity to one another are low-wage service workers or blue-collar workers. From there, our analysis zeroed in on metropolitan areas to determine which workforces have the highest percentages of these high-risk occupations.”
If you look at what they’ve charted, you’ll see the Miami-Fort Lauderdale-West Palm Beach stretch right at the top with 28% of its workers in these at-risk jobs. New York City is among the cities “whose workforces are most vulnerable.”
Simply put, lower-income people are at greater risk. Lower-income workers have to keep going out to work. Let us not forget that this is a “white-collar quarantine” as one small business owner put it, pointing out that for many with blue-collar jobs, it’s business as usual – that is, if they haven’t been laid off. And let’s remember that #WhenThisIsOver, those of us who did not go into this pandemic with good jobs behind us and a bit of money below us will likely be left reeling for years to come.
For those of us hanging on to the lower socioeconomic rungs, none of this is new. We see and feel these class differences keenly. The pandemic poses an opportunity for the rest of the country, and our leaders, to acknowledge these fissures and to figure out how we got here and how we can remedy them. As a nation, we’re only as strong as the most vulnerable in our society. The coronavirus shows how easily huge segments of our country – those who are the backbone of our country – can, and do, fall through the cracks.
The Washington Post · Mya Guarnieri
{Matzav.com}
That writer is talking for me! How will I pay my bills? Only Hashem knows! May He shoeer us with His rachmanus.
AMEN
While my heart goes out to the writer, I’m not sure what the point of the article is.
Yes, that’s the way of the world. Some people have it better and some have it worse. What does she want the gvirim to do? Be quiet? Post messages laughing at low-income families?
They’re just trying to express their their feelings of commiserating with the rest of society. And yes, it’s dangerous for them too.
So again, while I feel for her and her husband, what exactly does she want?
It’s hard to believe you could miss the point of the article. She is not merely writing about the general inequality of incomes which is a constant in society, but rather, that those with low-income positions who deal in close proximity with the public, must continue to work to survive, and that close proximity to others puts her and her family at great risk due to Covid-19. Similarly, by extrapolation, we can understand how enforced shut down of businesses deemed non-essential can put individuals in financial jeopardy who depend on a weekly check. Therefore, “we’re all in this together” becomes an empty aphorism.
Although you may never see this.
[I will not comment on the irrational anger that your economic status is more difficult at this period, but a note on unity…]
We WERE all in this together. Till you stepped out of the ring.
We WERE all affected together, we led lives that were based on what we believed were noble, good, and synergistic principles, lives which came to a grinding halt with the advent of this pandemic.
We WERE all united, in our schedules, meetings, sources of income, comforts, fears, and ability to connect, being upended and requiring human ingenuity, resolve, and pioneering to pull through unscathed. But you left the circle. You weren’t content that we wanted to be by your side, to encourage, to root for you, no. You were too entrapped in envy to say, “hey, there are some who have it a little easier”, or, “lets be happy that not everyone is broke to the core, “that there are still people to pay taxes”.
But no, you stepped out of the box. Because in your mind, if you have any pain more than someone else, it is the definition of unfairness. And the culprit? obviously the person who dared not be as pained as you.
There are many people who have unfortunate circumstances in this world. We can use that to divide us, or we can unite in a common goal.
The handicapped fellow does not lose intrinsic human worth because of their condition. Nor gain worth if they were to make others the same as them. Quite the contrary.
There is no reason why your economic status is in any way different than that, and if you think it is, perhaps tell envy that you don’t want to be together anymore, after all, without him, we would indeed all be in this together.
she should be ashamed of herself, she’s saying her husband puts his life at risk by running a cell phone shop. which in my opinion is not an essential business! so it should be closed anyway, she also said that New York is the epicenter for this pandemic, a FDNY Paramedic gets payed and average of $50,000 a year if anyone is at risk and if anyone gets underpaid its them. i live near a low income neighborhood and the reason it’s so bad there is because they’re still making bbq’s on each others porch without masks or gloves and sharing cigarettes hanging out by the bus stops and still riding the mta, which is still running for some reason. so stop spewing garbage. and yes we are all in this together, we all have someone close to us that is suffering you cant start saying well i’m suffering more. bad timing
Sounds like an advertisement for communism. How brilliant.
Washington Post – Perpetual Agent of Class Warfare
Watch what syndicated content you put online. Ask the WAPO’s somewhat wealthy owner Bezos if he feels guilt
Take national debt to China and pay it to US citizens in full satisfaction of the debt in light of Chinese negligence with pandemic
The point is that while wealthier people are screaming to keep this shutdown going, and for the government to arbitrarily decide what is “essential” and what is not, they are ignoring the many lower income people cannot afford it. It is literally costing their lives. So if you can afford to hunker down, fine BUT HOW DARE YOU DICTATE TO EVERYONE ELSE TO STARVE ??
There has always been a big disconnect between the “haves” and the “have-nots”. Nothing new under the sun. It not only applies to keeping businesses closed, it is also with backyard minyanim. If you analyze the inyan deeply, you will find the wealthier chevra berating and name calling those that daven with minyonim the loudest. Those that are insisting on davening in their backyard tend to be more pashuta lower income chevra. What’s pshat takeh? The wealthy want to continue their way of life unhindered. If (in their mind) these poor shleppers are still up and about, WE may catch something from the peasants or in order to avoid them, WE will have to change our daily haloch yelech. That, we can’t allow to happen, so let’s beat them down and call them rodfim, rotzchim etc and then we’ll be able to enjoy the benefits of life. Nu nu.
I don’t know what point this letter writer is trying to make. While many people can telecommute, that does not mean they are not effected. Their are many people in Real Estate, wealthy people, who may lose everything due to people not paying their rents (can’t cover their mortgages).
Many retailers including online retailers, are having their lines of credit pulled due to the crisis, which can easily cost them their business. There is virtually no business that is not at risk, and very few jobs which are safe right now Very few businesses can survive by telecommuting alone, having a job where you can telecommute, is of no help if the business closes down.
Just because the letter writer mentioned President Trump, I will respond to that specifically. If you think this virus is not impacting in a very significant way, you are naive. His money is invested in the hotel business, which has arguably been the hardest hit by this crisis. Not only that, Congress excluding the President from getting the financial relief that other companies can receive. The fact that he is able to do his job, while facing a personal financial catastrophe is actually pretty amazing