Am I the only one who thinks—what about the poor—when I hear people talk about helping to rebuild the middle-class or strengthening the middle-class? I don’t know about you, but I remember growing up seeing poor people, and years later, I remember talking with my mom and her telling me that we were poor, and when she was growing up in Detroit’s “Blackbottom” they were poor for real!
Have you ever asked yourself just what is the middle-class and just where did that term come from? I don’t know about you, but I never do all that math; I see four classes of people. I see poor people, people doing a little better than others (on the outside), people doing well and those that are grossly wealthy.
So, what is the middle-class? Sociologist Leonard Beeghley identifies a man making roughly $57,000 and his wife making roughly $40,000 with a household income of around $97,000 is middle-class.
Another sociologist identifies household incomes between $35,000 and $75,000 as being lower middle-class and $100,000 or more as being upper middle-class. Now I’m not saying these so-called middle-class people are rich, but if you bring home between $75,000-$100,000 a year, that looks damn good to someone making $7.25 an hour.
In the spirit of transparency, last week I saw a video of Rev. Dr. William Barber and Daily Show host Jon Stewart talking about his book, “White Poverty and Poor Peoples Campaign” which made me delve in deeper into the issue of poor people in this country.
Did you know that in 2024, the Federal Poverty Line (FPL) is $15,080.00 for one person and $31,200.00 for a family of four? Think about it—an annual income of $15,080.00 makes you poor as hell to me! So now some of you are saying, “Well that’s better than nothing, isn’t it?” Well, here’s the way I see that. If you have a knife in your back 12 inches, and someone pulls it out 6 inches, yes that helps, but you still have 6 inches of knife in your back and you are still hurting, bleeding and at death’s door.
When the average monthly rent in this country is between $1,372.00 and $1,563.00 a month and the federal minimum wage is $7.25 per hour, ($290.00 a week before taxes) giving you $15,080.00 per year (before taxes) and after paying your rent all year long, you are $724.00 in the hole at the end of the year. You noted I didn’t include little things like food, utilities and transportation to and from that $7.25 an hour job.
How many times have you heard people say, we have made so much progress in this country? Let me say to that, America couldn’t fall off the floor and for Black people and other poor and oppressed people living in America, America was on the floor. In August 1963, Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. marched on Washington for jobs and justice. He was primarily there to address the federal minimum wage, which was at the time, $1.25 per hour; 61 years ago.
Did you know that had America just stayed on track with inflation that minimum wage of $1.25 would be equivalent to $10.81 in 2023, yet today, in 2024, we are only at $7.25. We’ve made progress alright! So much so that according to current data, the top 1% in this country controls 30% of its wealth. Now that’s some progress for yo A$$!
Meanwhile, our brothers and sisters working in the service industry are supposed to get excited about a proposal to no longer tax their tips. How about paying them a living wage so they won’t need to depend on the magnanimity of patrons to make ends meet! How in the hell in any decent society can 1% of its population control 30% of its wealth? Don King was right—only in America.
The poor and the homeless (I don’t like or use the word unhoused) issue is a problem all over this country and guess what, putting a mini house in your backyard, building new houses and apartments that most people can’t afford to live in, and after you cut the ribbon, and the cameras are gone, in less than two months they are going to be back on the streets and sleeping in cars.
And you damn sure ain’t going to solve the problem of poverty and the poor by cutting taxes and allowing rich people to get richer because the crumbs will never fall from the table of the greedy, they would rather sweep them up than to give them to you (the poor).
Just maybe when Jesus said, “The poor you will always have with you, but you will not always have me.” I don’t need to ask, what would Jesus do, I read the book! He was asking us, all my good Christian friends, I believe, to do something about the poor among us.
