by Chuck Foster - Vol 2 Issue 14

Most of us enjoy the Christmas holidays. We look forward to the oven-roasted turkey, sliced cranberry, and pumpkin pie with a glass of eggnog on the side. We eagerly anticipate gathering around the fireplace to open numerous presents, our week off work with pay, and our plans of drunken bliss to come on the 31st. It’s the good life...for most, that is.

On the flip side of this Christian coin, it’s a different Christmas for too many others. Many Americans, Seattlelites among them, spend the days prior to Christmas hoping the upcoming holiday doesn’t screw up the arrival of their unemployment/state check, which for many is barely enough to survive on in the first place, let alone dream about the better things that most of us enjoy.

For some there are humiliating food bank lines to walk through, clouded with thoughts of arriving early enough to get the “good stuff” before it’s all gone. Many hope to pick up enough to make a meal, while many walk away with hardly anything eatable.

Last year I was one of the unemployed during the Christmas holidays, as was my good friend Mike. Actually, Mike wasn’t unemployed, but he was working day-labor which is about the same thing after taxes. He found it financially impossible to make it from week to week living in the slum of a downtown dump. Having to share a filthy bathroom, ride up a piss-stained elevator every day, and sleeping in a roach infested one room apartment with a gas leak didn’t make Christmas or any other day that joyous either

Mike left the slum shortly after that and become a proud member of the great northwest fishing industry. He now spends months at sea traveling from one port to another processing fish and crabs in freezing temperatures for minimum wage. In the off-season, which can be several months, he’s forced to survive on unemployment.

Some here in Seattle who have been laid off in recent months may receive enough to get by, but Mike on the other hand gets about $2.50 an hour to sit at home while he awaits the next season, or in his case, in our apartment.

Fortunately Mike’s one of the lucky ones who doesn’t have child support to pay every week. If he did, it would cost him 49% of his $2.50. In case you didn’t know, that’s the percentage that the state of Washington will take from your unemployment every week if you owe child support. Trust me, I know from my own experience, it left me $120.00 a week.

So what option does a family on unemployment have during these sick and twisted times? For many it means charging credit cards to the limit again to keep their children from feeling out of place when school returns. This may help our economy and the rich who basically run it during the Christmas holiday every year, but it puts a family one step closer to the street.

Of course there are plenty of loan companies to borrow money from during the holidays even if you don’t have any kind of credit established. Once again, just like at the federal banks, the poor are forced to pay interest through the nose, or in this case, the ass.

Why are the poor and middle class forced by every lending establishment to pay high interest rates to borrow money? So the rich can keep theirs with almost 0.0% interest rates. The bank has to make money and the poor always need a little, so why not stick it to them? I won’t even mention the way the bank hits the poor with overdraft charges; that’s a different story all together.

By now I am sure that I have several people in an uproar, wondering if I am suggesting giving all their money to the poor. My answer, not hardly.

I am trying to raise awareness of the situation that faces many men, women, and children during these magical holidays. Many who are well off in this country feel that the capitalistic system in this country is fair; if you work hard and save you can accomplish anything you set your mind to. The problem for many is trying to find work in the first place. Saving anything isn’t a possibility with the cost of living continuing to rise while wages remain level so these big companies can continue to get fatter.

The next time you pass a person in need or turn the channel on your new plasma TV and mock a charity raising money, try to think of how your life would be if you lost everything that you had. It’s happened to a lot of people in this country, it could happen to you.

Better yet, if you own a company with employees, think about doing something different, try taking care of them. That doesn’t mean a frozen turkey or a $20 gift certificate at X-MAS.

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!