Low Wage Workers Finding Poverty Harder to Escape
CHATTANOOGA, Tenn. At 7 in the morning, they are already lined up poultry plant workers, housekeepers, discount store clerks to ask for help paying their heating bills or feeding their families.
And once Metropolitan Ministries opens at 8 a.m., these workers fill the charitys 40 chairs, with a bawling infant adding to the commotion. From pockets and handbags they pull out utility bills or rent statements and hand them over to caseworkers, who often write checks $80, $110, $150 to patch over gaps in meeting this months expenses or filling the gas tank to get to work.
Just off her 10 p.m. to 6 a.m. shift, Erika McCurdy needed help last month with her electricity and heating bill, which jumped to $280 in January from the usual $120 a result of one of the coldest winters in memory. A nurses aide at an assisted living facility, Ms. McCurdy said there were many weeks when she couldnt make ends meet raising her 19-year-old son and 7-year-old daughter.
Theres just no way, making $9 an hour as a single parent with two children, that I can live without assistance, said Ms. McCurdy, 40, a strong-voiced, solidly built Chattanooga native.
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/17/business/economy/low-wage-workers-finding-its-easier-to-fall-into-poverty-and-harder-to-get-out.html