Page 209 - Demo

297502 Direct Loan Program, which has moved more than two million families into their own homes. These loans, fully guaranteed and serviced by the Department of Agriculture, come with low interest rates and, for very poor families, cover the entire cost of the mortgage, nullifying the need for a down payment. . . . Expanding a program like this into urban communities would provide even more low- and moderate-income families with homes of their own.We should also ensure fair access to capital. . . . States should rein in payday-lending institutions and insist that lenders make it clear to potential borrowers what a loan is ultimately likely to cost them. Just as fast-food restaurants must now publish calorie counts next to their burgers and shakes, payday-loan stores should publish the average overall cost of different loans. When Texas adopted disclosure rules, residents took out considerably fewer bad loans. If Texas can do this, why not California or Wisconsin? . . .%u2022 %u2022 %u2022In Tommy Orange%u2019s novel, %u201cThere There,%u201d a man trying to describe the problem of suicides on Native American reservations says: %u201cKids are jumping out the windows of burning buildings, falling to their deaths. And we think the problem is that they%u2019re jumping.%u201d The poverty debate has suffered from a similar kind of myopia. For the past half-century, we%u2019ve approached the poverty question by pointing to poor people themselves%u2014posing questions about their work ethic, say, or their welfare benefits%u2014when we should have been focusing on the fire. The question that should serve as a looping incantation, the one we should ask every time we drive past a tent encampment, those tarped American slums smelling of asphalt and bodies, or every time we see someone asleep on the bus, slumped over in work clothes, is simply: Who benefits? Not: Why don%u2019t you find a better job? Or: Why don%u2019t you move? Or: Why don%u2019t you stop taking out payday loans? But: Who is feeding off this?Those who have amassed the most power and capital bear the most responsibility for America%u2019s vast poverty: political elites who have utterly failed low-income Americans over the past half-century; corporate bosses who have spent and schemed to prioritize profits over families; lobbyists blocking the will of the American people with their self-serving interests; property owners who have exiled the poor from entire cities and fueled the affordable-housing crisis. Acknowledging this is both crucial and deliciously absolving; it directs our attention upward and distracts us from all the ways (many unintentional) that we%u2014we the secure, the insured, the housed, the college-educated, the protected, the lucky%u2014also contribute to the problem.Corporations benefit from worker exploitation, sure, but so do consumers, who buy the cheap goods and services the working poor produce, and so do those of us directly or indirectly invested in the stock market. Landlords are not the only ones who benefit from housing exploitation; many homeowners do, too, their property values propped up by the collective effort to make housing scarce and expensive. The banking and payday-lending industries profit from the financial exploitation of the poor, but so do those of us with free checking accounts, as those accounts are subsidized by billions of dollars in overdraft fees.Living our daily lives in ways that express solidarity with the poor could mean we pay more; anti-exploitative investing could dampen our stock portfolios. By acknowledging those costs, we acknowledge our complicity. Unwinding ourselves from our neighbors%u2019 deprivation and refusing to live as enemies of the poor will require us to pay a price. It%u2019s the price of our restored humanity and renewed country. 2023305 Matthew DesmondAccording to Desmond, what is the relationship between exploitation and poverty? How does he go beyond pointing fingers at corporations, landlords, and other frequently referenced adversaries of the working class?44Copyright %u00a9 Bedford, Freeman & Worth Publishers. Distributed by Bedford, Freeman & Worth Publishers. For review purposes only. Not for redistribution.