aaaarrgh!!
While currently in New Zealand, most of my life I live in Oakland California. Our neighborhood is the ghetto - drug dealers known by sight (if not by name), the occasional drive-by (once a year at most), but really just tons of families trying to make it. I can say with utter certainty that every one of the people there are gainfully employed. In fact, of all of them, I am probably the only one on government benefits (schizo/borderline), and even then, I am 'paid' $660 a month, with no housing (roughly one fifth what my meds alone cost); even the drug dealers aren't on welfare, mostly because it involves too much scrutiny. The American work ethic is very strong, in fact the only person I've known to live on public assistance was my friend Cecelia, who just couldn't be bothered to get a job. In the few times she even interviewed for a job as a paralegal, she turned down the job, as it only paid $45,000 and she thought she was worth $65,000 -- after being out of work for a year and a half!! I guess what I'm saying is the temptation to get something for nothing -and then bitch about it- is universal, as is the rage it engenders in hardworking people. In the US the want of money is looked down on by those who have it, and the lack of money is repulsive, so you're damned for wanting more and damned for being poor, keeping the poor where they - including me - are.
(sar "though she be but little she is fierce", Wed 19 Mar 2008, 0:52, Reply)