It is tricky being in a community which is predominantly more moneyed than your family and burns a brand into poorer people that never goes away. Greasers and socs stay greasers and socs into their 90s, and then they die.
My parents collect cans for a living
21–30 of 419 posts
Re: My parents collect cans for a living
#22I like these types of stories that show the harsh economic realities of many in America. It was not the case many years ago, when they could become an American citizen by working hard enough. Now they are servants, beholden to the corrupted members of our government.
Re: My parents collect cans for a living
#23From the article "Jessica is a proud first-generation Ecuadorian-American and a second-year Percy Ellis Sutton Search for Education, Elevation, and Knowledge (SEEK) student at Baruch College majoring in business management with a minor in law and policy." Jessia is the American dream. First generation, got to college and writing like that. Lots of Americans concentrate on what is wrong with America. There is value in…
No post body was provided.
Re: My parents collect cans for a living
#24I like these types of stories that show the harsh economic realities of many in America. It was not the case many years ago, when they could become an American citizen by working hard enough. Now they are servants, beholden to the corrupted members of our government.
>Now they are servants, beholden to the corrupted members of our government.
ITYM corporations. The government is desperately trying to help and corporate interests (in the form of Joe Manchin's blocking of the BBB act) are how we got to this point.
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2021/12/joe-man...
Most people have forgotten that we "solved" the ozone hole problem through regulation. We could have done the same for green house emmissions. But businesses did not want cut into their profits and now here we are.
Re: My parents collect cans for a living
#25Earlier quoted context omitted.
The writing in this article is incredible and I have nothing but admiration for the author and her family. But, to me, this situation is what’s wrong with America. Why are people who are clearly so hard working struggling to get by?
wait till you realize what's happening in the rest of the world. where people work much harder and still don't get by.
That's classic whataboutism. That doesn't explain away why it's that bad in the US nor does it justify accepting the status quo.
Re: My parents collect cans for a living
#26I am curious: if you collect cans for a living, do you qualify for government assistance? Is it possible that Jessica Yauri receives aid earmarked for children so they can get proper nutrition, via her parents? She does not mention if she qualifies for lunch assistance. Also, I am assuming that she goes to a public school where she doesn't have to pay to attend. It is also not clear if she receives further aid in support of her going to college.
There is a mention of $400 towards high school fees causing some anxiety among her parents, but beyond that, not too many concrete details.
The focus of the article is on the writer's experience with the shame she experiences because of her parents' job, so perhaps it's not the right place for this information, but the composite picture would be a much more faithful representation of the overall experience of Jessica's.
This is also a point where America needs to introspect, as a nation: sure, we import less-fortunate immigrants, in large part because they are much more willing to do dirty jobs such as gathering cans, but it's also true that it all comes out in the wash: society as a whole is responsible for bearing the costs of keeping these people fed, clothed, schooled, and taken care of in medical emergencies. If you added up the costs, is the labor "cheap" anymore, or does it make more sense to discourage the immigration of what is likely to be a 2-3 generation underclass, and incentivise people already here to step in?
Re: My parents collect cans for a living
#27My family used to do this all the time when we were kids. We'd go along the ditches on the side of the road and make a family outing of it on weekends. At the beach my brother and I would drag big plastic garbage bags around and collect as much as we could from people who were happy to help some kids out and also happy to be rid of the bottles and cans. You could make some decent coin at it, but that was also in the 80s when 5c a can and 10-20c a bottle was worth something.
It gets into your bones. Even today with 25 years software dev experience under my belt, I still feel the twitch whenever I see a discarded bottle or can.
Re: My parents collect cans for a living
#28From the article "Jessica is a proud first-generation Ecuadorian-American and a second-year Percy Ellis Sutton Search for Education, Elevation, and Knowledge (SEEK) student at Baruch College majoring in business management with a minor in law and policy." Jessia is the American dream. First generation, got to college and writing like that. Lots of Americans concentrate on what is wrong with America. There is value in…
The writing in this article is incredible and I have nothing but admiration for the author and her family. But, to me, this situation is what’s wrong with America. Why are people who are clearly so hard working struggling to get by?
No post body was provided.
Re: My parents collect cans for a living
#29I have not thought about collecting cans in a very long time. Decades ago you could make a decent bit of cash collecting aluminum cans. It was a common past time for poor people and undoubtedly contributed to the very high recycle rate for aluminum since it was a source of income for many people. This was widely known, so people would often go out of their way to make their aluminum trash easily available to be colle…
It’s still a thing in the third world. But it’s very very low in income. (Maybe that’s what the actual article is about, haven’t read it yet.)
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Re: My parents collect cans for a living
#30I have not thought about collecting cans in a very long time. Decades ago you could make a decent bit of cash collecting aluminum cans. It was a common past time for poor people and undoubtedly contributed to the very high recycle rate for aluminum since it was a source of income for many people. This was widely known, so people would often go out of their way to make their aluminum trash easily available to be colle…
In the San Francisco Bay area, collecting cans is still very common among the homeless. In some parts of SF people will dig through your recycling (and garbage) every garbage day for recycling. Additionally, many public garbage cans have a semi-open section at the top which I have seen used for disposing of cans. I don't know if it's intentionally designed that way, but it's much easier for anyone to get the cans fro…
I keep my cans and bottles separate from paper etc and place them at the top of the wheelie bin when I put out the recycling.