Life as a Flashing Yellow Light
The people introduced in this chapter are quite different from each other, yet their experiences share something in common. They are hardworking people who have been pushed into the struggling class. Some by the underemployment of long hours at low-wage jobs, and some by stagnant wages in the face of rising housing costs. Even so, the people who struggle to cover their bills each month are invisible when politicians and the media celebrate gains in the stock market. As a nation, we still haven’t opened a conversation about economic self-sufficiency for workers.
We have a federal poverty line set so low that it excludes millions of families who are unable to afford basic necessities each month, even people who literally cannot afford housing. The “fair market rent,” established by HUD as a guideline to ensure that families pay no more than 30% of their income in rent, is all but meaningless. Yet this guideline is used in every calculation of economic need. Clearly, the government uses skewed measures that minimize the reported numbers of people who are struggling. We can’t begin to have an honest, national conversation about class unless we confront the real numbers and recognize that it’s no accident that millions of people have trouble making ends meet. Through a collusion of business and government, the economy systemically creates vast profits for some, through low wages and high rents. Even beyond the cost of housing, there is a lot of money being made off the backs of struggling families. In the next chapter we’ll look at just how business manages to pull that rabbit out of the hat.
Notes
1 1 In the 1890s Berea College president William Goodell Frost made the first attempt to create “Appalachia” by consolidating 194 counties in eight states. In 1921, John Campbell expanded the area to include 254 counties in nine states. The Appalachian Regional Commission redrew the boundaries of Appalachia to include regions beyond the Appalachian Mountains that share nothing with the region but entrenched poverty. Today, Appalachia stretches across 700,000 square miles and includes counties in thirteen states: Alabama, Mississippi, Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia, Kentucky, West Virginia, Ohio, Maryland, Pennsylvania, and New York. West Virginia is the only state entirely within Appalachia.
2 2 Even so, the US Census located a significant Shawnee community on the Little Kanawha River in 1902.
3 3 MARTIN, R. 2014. For $20 Million, a Coal Utility Bought an Ohio Town and a Clear Conscience. The Atlantic, Oct 16.
4 4 In 1965 the Johnson administration redefined “Appalachia” to include 420 counties and created the Appalachian Regional Commission as part of the “War on Poverty.” ARC ranked the counties on a scale of economic distress. The intent was to target strategies that would support economic development. ARC’s economic ranking of counties continues today and has helped to make Appalachia visible to the rest of the country as a place of poverty.
5 5 Five of these villages have populations that hover around 500; two have populations of close to 1,000 and a third has about 1,700 people.
6 6 To qualify for SNAP benefits (food stamps) family eligibility is capped at 130% of the federal poverty line. In Athens County 70% of the population earns less than this. MORRIS, C. 2017. Going Hungry in Athens County. Athens News, May 21.
7 7 INGRAHAM, C. 2014. 1.6 Million Americans Don’t Have Indoor Plumbing. Here’s Where They Live. The Washington Post, April 23.
8 8 The firefighters who battle those blazes include massive numbers of prisoners who, without adequate protection or equipment, work for $2 a day. They earn an extra $1 for every hour they are actively battling a fire.
9 9 WILKINS, D. & LOMAWAIMA, K. T. 2001. Uneven Ground: American Indian Sovereignty and Federal Law, Norman, OK, University of Oklahoma Press.
10 10 The Laramie Treaty of 1851 created the Great Sioux Reservation which crossed the boundaries of North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, Wyoming and Montana. In 1874, when settlers discovered gold in the Sioux’s Black Hills, the Sioux were removed from their sacred sites and moved into a smaller area. In 1980, the Supreme Court ruled that the sacred lands of the Black Hills were illegally taken and that tribes were due nearly $106 million in compensation. The tribes refused the money offered for their sacred sites and continue to demand return of the land.
11 11 The Lakota and Dakota had been known by their neighbors the Ojibwa as the Nadouwesou. French traders later shortened and corrupted this name to Sioux.
12 12 STANDING ROCK SIOUX TRIBE. 2018. 2018–2022 Comprehensive Economic Development Strategy.
13 13 There are several Sioux divisions, each with a distinctive language and culture. The Dakota people of Standing Rock include the Upper and Lower Yanktonai. The Lakota people of Standing Rock include the Hunkpapa and Sihasapa.
14 14 Since no other racial/ethnic group in the United States has signed treaties with the federal government, American Indians have a unique standing that distinguishes them from other “minority” groups. See WILKINS, D. & LOMAWAIMA, K. T. 2001. Uneven Ground: American Indian Sovereignty and Federal Law, Norman, OK, University of Oklahoma Press.
15 15 The ability to determine who is and isn’t part of a tribe is an essential element of what makes tribes sovereign entities. While individual tribes are able to set their own membership qualifications, the federal government’s requirement of a 25% “blood quantum” is the basis for all federal recognition including all census data and entitlement programs. As of this writing, only 566 tribal nations are federally recognized.
16 16 STANDING ROCK SIOUX TRIBE. 2018. 2018–2022 Comprehensive Economic Development Strategy.
17 17 LEE, T. 2014. No Man’s Land: The Last Tribes of the Plains. MSNBC, Sept 21.
18 18 STANDING ROCK SIOUX TRIBE. 2018. 2018–2022 Comprehensive Economic Development Strategy.
19 19 Ibid.
20 20 REGAN, S. 2014. 5 Ways the Government Keeps Native Americans in Poverty. Forbes, March 13.
21 21 TICKAMYER, A. R. & WORNELL, E. 2017. How to Explain Poverty? In: TICKAMYER, A. R., SHERMAN, J. & WARLICK, J. (eds.) Rural Poverty in the United States, New York, Columbia University Press.
22 22 The Districts are: Fort Yates, ND (pop 1961); Cannon Ball, ND (pop 847); Bear Soldier, SD (pop 758); Wakpala, SD (pop 707); Running Antelope, SD (pop 695); Bullhead, SD (pop 692); Kenel, SD (pop 259); Porcupine, ND (pop 210). STANDING ROCK SIOUX TRIBE. 2018. 2018–2022 Comprehensive Economic Development Strategy.
23 23 The surrounding community has a population density of about nine people per square mile.
24 24 See https://www.unitedstateszipcodes.org/58528/#stats.
25 25 LEE, T. 2014. No Man’s Land: The Last Tribes of the Plains. MSNBC, Sept 21.
26 26 Ibid.
27 27 HARRIS, D. 2019. The Cost of Raising a Baby. At https://www.parenting.com/pregnancy/planning/the-cost-of-raising-a-baby.
28 28 The national benchmark (90% percentile nationwide) for low birthweight is 6%. Both Sioux County and Corson County are above this level, at 7.1% and 6.9% respectively, indicating that a wide range of environmental factors, health-care access, and health behaviors are affecting maternal and infant health on the reservation. STANDING ROCK SIOUX TRIBE. 2018. 2018–2022 Comprehensive Economic Development Strategy.
29 29 The motor vehicle crash death rate is highly significant on the reservation as compared to North and South Dakota more generally. Sioux County has a crash death rate of 109 per 100,000 people, 5.7 times higher than North Dakota; Corson County (where Ellison lives) has 137 crash deaths per 100,000 people, six times higher than South Dakota. Ibid.
30 30 HALPERN, S. 2019. The One-Traffic-Light Town with Some of the Fastest Internet in the U.S. The New Yorker, Dec 3.
31 31 Racist stereotypes about Native people and alcohol