Opposing Views of the Poor

The Dec. 12 article, “The Poor Have More Things Today -- Including Wild Income Swings,” presents a sadly familiar dilemma. More than 35 million of our fellow Americans, including 13 million children, live below the poverty line. Despite the negative stereotypes of lazy, substance-abusing ne’er-do-wells, the truth is that 40% of the people showing up at food banks live in families with at least one adult who works full time. Whether or not one believes that government has any responsibility for those who don’t work because of mental or physical disability, lack of skills or immigrant status, it is scandalous that people can work full time and still be unable to support their families.

California is ahead of the game -- our minimum wage is $6.75 an hour. The federal rate is $5.15 an hour, or about $11,000 for full-time employment. How many of us could live on that even without a family? It appears that social justice is no longer a moral value.

Barbara H. Bergen

Vice President and

General Counsel

MAZON: A Jewish Response

to Hunger, Los Angeles

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Your front-page depiction of the Salvadoran immigrants’ plight prominently featured a large color TV set and a computer. I noted that the Rojas family also has a car. Instead of a tendency to view our society as glass-half-empty, The Times should reflect on the fact that the likelihood of the Rojases to have the possessions featured on the front-page photo is almost nil had they stayed in their birth country. Perhaps the working poor may benefit more from getting some guidance in financial planning than yet more social subsidy. Why not set some money aside for a rainy day instead of spending so much on acquiring more material things?

I was also perplexed over the statement that “for the most part, the poor have been left to cope on their own.” Does it ever enter the writer’s mind that just about everyone else in our country, current and former Congress members and presidents excepted, are required to do no less?

John T. Chiu

Newport Beach

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Along with the increased volatility of income among working poor families, do not forget that these families are three times as likely to have adults without high school diplomas and health insurance as other working families, and they pay an inordinate share of their income to housing. These conditions, combined with the decline in economic mobility for working families, mean that the goal of economic self-sufficiency and security is an increasingly distant dream for millions of American working families.

Brandon Roberts

Manager, Working Poor

Families Project

Chevy Chase, Md.

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The Times, as an example of poverty in America, chose the example of Elvira Rojas. My, how times have changed! When I came to America in the late ‘60s, I was really poor: two suitcases and $50. Like Rojas, I held two jobs, but unlike her, I could not afford a TV, credit cards, entertain on china settings or shop at Robinsons-May. I never asked for a handout from the government and, with all this uncertainty, would not bring a couple of children into this world at taxpayer expense.

Nicole Richaudeau

Thousand Oaks

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Robert Rector’s statement, “We’ve won the War on Poverty,” reminds me of another premature declaration by another “influential” conservative regarding another war: “Mission Accomplished.”

As your article shows, such bravado is as unwarranted in referring to the challenges facing the working poor in our own country as in the case of Iraq.

Bill Pitkin

Chatsworth