My take on the 99%

I read a post today that really made me think about who I am, where I have come from and what I need to say about the 99% movement.

While I am in the 99% percent, I am not personally suffering during this economic downturn. I am finishing my PhD and my husband has a good job. However...

This was not always the case.

When my parents divorced, I lost the security of our working middle class life and was thrust into poverty. I lived in a public housing project, with family members, friends, in various apartments. I moved 12x by the time I graduated high school. I experienced hunger. I experienced the humiliation of having people look at me like some kind of loser when we used food stamps. I was made fun of at school for my shabby clothes.

In all regards, I have done everything right in life. I got good grades and got a scholarship to college and I worked part-time while in school, taking 16-24 credit hours a semester to finish in 4 years. During that time, I was financially responsible for my family as well as my own personal education expenses. All of this cost money. I went on to get my MS in much the same fashion, which cost some more money. By the time I finished the first year of my PhD (the first time), I had $84K in student loan debt.

After I got married my life changed. It is much easier now. Yes, I don't see my husband. Yes, I don't have very much time for friends. Yes, I work about 80-100 hrs most weeks. Yes, I am severely underpaid ($17K/yr before taxes) But, you know what?

I am really blessed and I know it. I don't face cold or hunger anymore. I don't worry that this month is the month I will lose my home. I have the luxury, instead, of being able to put a portion of my meager salary toward retirement, even as I am working on paying those student loans back. I am really lucky. So many people who I know who have grown up in poverty have worked every bit as hard as I have and are not as blessed as I am.

On the other hand, people I know in school now, whose parents had the money to help them in college, are finishing their PhDs with significantly less debt than I am. They will start their careers in much better positions than I will. They will move up the economic ladder faster than I will. I am still far behind my counterparts who were born into families who had greater advantage than I did.

To argue that those who are suffering are in the position they are simply because they made bad decisions is to severely misjudge how the American capitalist system works. In my humble opinion, it suggests a very shallow understanding of both this and one's fellow citizens. The truth is that you can make all the right choices in life and still have the rug ripped out from under you. At the same time, there are people in the world today who make bad decisions all the time and still manage to do far better than their fellow citizens. While we are all created equal in the eyes of the law, this does not mean that we all begin as blank slates with equal resources and starting positions. In judging one's fellow wo/man, perhaps  some of the 99% and the 1% should step down from their self-righteous pedestals and walk a few miles in someone else's shoes, just as every religion stipulates as does every ethical tradition.

I stand with the 99%, because I know for a fact that you can do everything right and still come up short.

Sincerely,

Slightly_Rifted