Do We Need a Poor People's Coming-Out Movement?
by Laura Flanders
Governor Andrew Cuomo says raising the minimum wage in New York is harder than passing marriage equality. Is that true? Is it spin? If we were to say it’s true—is it all about money, or could it be that there’s something we need, namely a coming-out movement about poverty in America?
Democrats in the New York State Assembly have passed a bill to raise the minimum wage from the federal $7.25 to $8.50 an hour. Last week, during a Capitol press conference, the governor said this is probably where the bill is stuck at least for this session. There’s likely to be no passing a minimum wage hike through the Republican-controlled Senate, the issue’s just too divisive, said the governor. Isn’t this the same savvy politician who last year convinced four Senate Republicans to pass a bill legalizing same-sex marriage? Cuomo insisted that this time it’s different.
“This is broader and a deeper divide,” Cuomo said. “Marriage, in some ways, was more of a personal judgment for people on their personal values.
There’s certainly a case to be made that the governor could apply himself more forcefully to the task of raising the wage. (Although the speaker wouldn’t like it, he could for example, hike the wage by order of the state Labor Department.) It’s also true that where politics is concerned, deeply held beliefs are usually less relevant than deep pockets. Most LGBT activists aren’t well-to-do—but some are, and they knew how to use it. The wage-raisers, by contrast, may have the popular will on their side, but they’re up against an entire Chamber of Commerce–funded army of opinion shapers, propagandists and paid-off politicians who argue that living wages lead to dead business. They’re up against the well financed spin, and they’re up against the already freaked-out business owners who believe it.
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2012/06/03-4
In the United States today, some 103 million Americans live in or near poverty; 6 million Americans are living on an income of only food stamps. Poor in American means being invisible.
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Even though tens of millions of Americans fit the definition of "poor" it seems to me that shelf space in the media for this issue is almost non-existent. Poverty only passes editorial guidelines when the story somehow involves "boostraps", "lottery", "thanks to the generosity of . . ." or "god and jesus" winds up being the punchline.
Unfortunately it seems the poor buy into the cultural shorthand of poverty or don't want to be tarnished by it and seek to hide their condition. Poor people are lazy, immoral, in the grips of some vice or maybe even suffering the punishment of god. That's the shorthand. 
The poor and especially the working poor could wake some people up just by showing themselves. They don't have to do or say anything.
minimum wage of $7.25, doesn't have enough money to afford a one-bedroom apartment ANYWHERE in the US.
A job with a living income isn't too much to ask for, and neither you nor the 46 million other people with similar circumstances should be looked down on. The down looks must be on the system and people that created the massive homelessness and poverty in the United States - a country with 8.2 million millionaires! Greed abounds...
The disregard and refusal to see the "invisible poor" is well illustrated in this picture.
