In America, we’re really good at ignoring the people in the middle
“In these conversations, people tend to think ‘below the poverty line.’ We’re bringing awareness to this forgotten middle,” said Rosie Allen-Herring, president and CEO of the United Way of the National Capital Area. “What do you do when you’re in the middle? These are our neighbors and family members, these are individuals living paycheck to paycheck, one emergency away from poverty.”
“I was there for the patients, because once covid hit, we were the only companions for all those people at the time,” she said. “We were there for them when no one else could visit.”For years, she earned a little more than $14 an hour as a health-care maintenance worker. That has kept her just above the federal poverty line — $26,500, an antiquated standard adjusted annually but established in 1963.
These are the folks that Congress needs to see when we’re talking about the minimum wage, about health care and assistance — not just the ones who fell off the cliff, but the ones barely hanging on.“It’s not just the homeless veteran suffering from PTSD, living under a bridge,” Allen-Herring said. “It’s more than that. “What we’re seeing is a mismatch between earnings and the increasing cost of basic necessities.
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