Minimum [Adventure]

 

[Adventure 159]

She was in tears, trying to decide which groceries to put back. 

I didn't really have the money to spend on someone else, but she had three small children and it was a little over twenty dollars worth of stuff, so I paid for it.  No one should have to choose between food and diapers and a bottle of ibuprofen. 

Putting my groceries in my van, I noticed her finishing up buckling her kids into their carseats. I walked over and told her what a good job she was doing as a mom - she was so patient and loving with her children. 

She said she didn't feel at all like she was a good mom. She was living on food stamps and state assistance and unemployment. She's been looking for a job, but everywhere that's hiring is paying minimum wage and that doesn't cover childcare for her children and pay the bills. If she gets a job, she becomes homeless after a month or two. If she gets two jobs, she doesn't see her children and she still can't make ends meet. Childcare is expensive.

She didn't plan for life to be this way. She didn't plan for her husband to die. They had been doing ok. They had both been working full time and had enough to live off of. They arranged their schedules so childcare wasn't needed. Then her husband got covid and was hospitalized and she got laid off and he died. This wasn't how it was supposed to be.

So when I see people posting how people should just go back to work and these same people are against raising the minimum wage, I ask them to explain how to live off of minimum wage if you have children and childcare expenses and medical bills ... and possibly even funeral and burial expenses. Minimum wage is not a living wage for a single person nevermind someone with children. 

Please, next time you find yourself judging someone for choosing not to work, or for being on government assistance, realize that for many it's not a choice easily made - and it's not a choice to "work the system." It's the choice to not be homeless; it's the choice to be able to feed their children; and maybe it's a choice to give three young children as normal a life as possible after they've experienced one of the biggest losses of their lives.