When Poverty Becomes Personal

My girlfriend, Denise teaches at Newton High School in New Jersey. Her students are by no means poor on the level inner city teachers might be used to but they are not well off either. Their parents are, for the most part, blue collar workers. They do not go on many vacations, they do not drive new fancy cars. They are, in short, living a life which is typically American.
But, the America her students’ parents inherited and the one they will inherit are two very different things. America is no longer the promised land or, perhaps more appropriately, America is no longer the land of milk and honey. It is, in fact, milk that brought up a conversation Denise and I just had about how dire a situation her students are going to find themselves in.
“If you have kids, they are drinking milk with every meal. And, people can no longer afford to buy milk”. This is what Denise said to me, and she is right. According to a story in the New York Daily News, milk prices have gone up 36% since last winter. The average price of a gallon of milk is $4.31. The wages of a working class family have not increased 36% since last winter and yet these families are supposed to be able to pay for gasoline, mortgages, car insurance, health insurance, and milk!
So, what happens to the kids who Denise teaches? Kids who should have the choice to go to college, or to go to trade school, or to join their Dad in his field. They enlist. The answer to all McCain’s prayers. Several weeks ago I posted a blog which asked where the soldiers to continue the war in Iraq and go to Afghanistan and Iran were going to come from. Now I have my answer. Prices have gotten so high and politicians so far removed that many American families find their children, who are just now coming of age, caught between battlefields and the streets.