Results tagged “debt”

10/23/09 1:00 PM

Off the Recession Road

On "Shoulding" the Homeless

92180901.jpgA piece I recently wrote about a homeless family sparked a flood of angry comments coming to me via multiple routes, which argued what the people "should" have done to prevent their current hardship. Since my natural inclination is to appreciate different perspectives and empathize with individual struggles, I can understand clearly how it provides comfort to pass judgment on the homeless. If you believe there are things someone should have or could have done differently, then that means it could never happen to you.
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10/22/09 2:15 PM

Day 131: Bismarck, ND

"You Have to Go Where the Jobs Are"

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Of all the people I've met on this trip, Ben Robertson may have adopted the wisest and consequently most successful approach to finding new employment following a job loss. Unemployed in Colorado after mass layoffs from the natural gas fields, Ben began researching jobless statistics state-by-state. He and his wife Lily had never considered living in North Dakota before, but with an unemployment rate running roughly half the national average, Ben concluded: "You have to go where the jobs are."

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10/12/09 1:50 PM

Day 121: Seattle, WA

Milking the Poor: One Family's Fall Into Homelessness

seattlemom.JPG The descent into homelessness can be equated to falling off a cliff. Wealth buys passage on toll roads a safe distance from the edge, but poverty's foot path runs along the craggy and unstable lip of a gaping precipice. Emma and her family hit a few ledges on the way down, blown by winds of misfortune every time they began to regain stable footing. As Emma describes their story: "It's too much bad luck for anyone to believe." 
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