Going for broke : living on the edge in the world's richest country / edited by Alissa Quart and David Wallis.

Format:

Book

Contributor:

Quart, Alissa, editor.

Wallis, David (David R.), editor.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Poor--United States.

Poor.

Poor--United States--Personal narratives.

Working poor--United States.

Working poor.

Working poor--United States--Personal narratives.

Working class--United States.

Working class.

Working class--United States--Personal narratives.

Poverty--United States.

Poverty.

United States--Social conditions--21st century.

United States.

United States--Social policy--21st century.

Poor--Government policy--United States--21st century.

United States--Economic conditions--21st century.

Economic history.

Poor--Government policy.

Social conditions.

Social policy.

Genre:

Personal narratives.

Physical Description:

360 pages : illustrations ; 22 cm

Place of Publication:

Chicago, Illinois : Haymarket Books, 2023

Summary:

"A collection of compelling, hard-hitting first-person essays, poems, and photos that expose what our punitive social systems do to so many Americans. Going for Broke, edited by Alissa Quart, Executive Director of the Economic Hardship Reporting Project, and David Wallis, former Managing Director of EHRP, gives voice to a range of gifted writers for whom "economic precarity" is more than just another assignment. All illustrate what the late Barbara Ehrenreich, who conceived of EHRP, once described as "the real face of journalism today: not million dollar-a-year anchorpersons, but low-wage workers and downwardly spiraling professionals." One essayist and grocery store worker describes what it is like to be an "essential worker" during the pandemic; another reporter and military veteran details his experience with homelessness and what would have actually helped him at the time. These dozens of fierce and sometimes darkly funny pieces reflect the larger systems that have made writers' bodily experiences, family and home lives, and work far harder than they ought to be. Featuring introductions by luminaries including Michelle Tea, Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor, and Astra Taylor, Going for Broke is revelatory. It shows us the costs of income inequality to our bodies and our minds--and demonstrates real ways to change our conditions."--Publisher's website.

Contents:

Introduction

Section 1 : The body

Introduction

Love and war

A stay at kings county

I did my own abortion because Texas used COVID-19 as an excuse to shut down abortion clinics

"Women afraid of dying while they are trying to find their life"

Medicaid has been good to my body, but it has abandoned my brain

My disability is my superpower - If only employers could see it that way

A trip to the nail salon with missing fingers

Traumatic pregnancies are awful - Dobbs will make them so much worse

The twisted business of donating plasma

To help the homeless, offer shelter that allows deep sleep

Inequity in maternal health care left me with undiagnosed postpartum PTSD

Anything of value

Section 2 : Home Introduction : The organized abandonment of shelter

Homeless in a pandemic : The housing poetry of Jennifer Fitzgerald

Meet Tomeka Langford

Unaddressed

Evictionland

37,000 US veterans are homeless - I was one of them

Why I choose to live house-free in Alaska

I was wrongly detained at the border - It's part of a larger problem

I watched war erupt in the Balkans - Here's what I see in America today

A fierce desire to stay : Looking at West Virginia through its people's eyes

Section 3 : Family

Don't be this way forever

When my father called me about his unemployment

I took in a homeless couple - would you?

My marriage was broken - The coronavirus lockdown saced it

P.S. 42

My sister is a recovering heroin addict - I can't fix her, but she also can't fix herself

In the pandemic, cooking connected me to my ancestors

The underground economy of unpaid care

The worst part of being poor : Watching your dog die when you can't afford to help

Nomen est omen

Section 4 : Work

Introduction : To make work visible, again and again

How the taxi workers won

My pandemic year behind the checkout counter : On working amid paranoid customers, hungry shoplifters, sick coworkers, and people who just need a bathroom

From academic to assembly-line worker

Once upon a time, waitress was a union job - could history repeat itself?

Why I check the "Black" box : I learned racial ambiguitu was not something I could afford

My life as a retail worker : Nasty, brutish, and poor

What it's like riding along with a valet driver at a San Francisco strip club

You talk real good

The secret lives of adjunct professors

The poetry of labor : On Rodrigo Toscano and the art of work

Zen and the art of uber driving

Section 5 : Class

The difference between being broke and being poor

That sinking feeling

Off our butts : How smoking bans extinguish solidarity

Never-ending sentences

The dignity of the thrift store

Class dismissed

For years, I've tried to work my way back into the middle class

What does it mean to be "bad with money"?

Acknowledgments

Notes

Index.

Notes:

"An anthology from the Economic Hardship Reporting Project."--title page.

Includes bibliographical references (pages 342-350) and index.

ISBN:

9781642599657

1642599654

OCLC:

1374814281