Alissa Quart wants us to think not only about downward mobility, industry shifts, and low wage white collar jobs, but also about what not having money does to us and our bodies.
Great piece. As someone who grew up comfortably upper middle class, and attended a small well-regarded liberal arts college, it was eye-opening to meet so many individuals like Ms. Stine. It was an important part of my education as a human being that had nothing to do with books or lecture halls.
On another note, just watched your interview on CBS. Very sweet. I do love a happy ending!
I graduated from a "little Ivy" in 1989. My family was lower middle class, usually kind of broke but not actually poor. The college I imprinted on like a privileged duckling offered me zero financial aid in spite of the fact that my dad managed a KMart and my mom had only just gone back to work as a teacher. They had three children younger than I still at home; we grew most of our own food; my sense of style had been defined by pretending I WANTED to shop at thrift stores bc it was cooler. Still, no scholarships for me. I didn't know how to find the ones other than what the college offered--didn't know that was a thing, in fact! My parents didn't say "no, this is stupid expensive and we cannot afford it," they took on debt, I took on debt (with no idea what it actually meant) and off I went.
I had no idea how to study because I was smart enough to just fake it in high school. good grades with no effort. College was a rude awakening and I'd have lost any scholarships I'd gotten with a GPA requirement. I had no idea how to relate to these kids that had spent summers at camp and had add-a-bead necklaces and the money for textbooks. I reacted to the Young Reaganites by embracing hippie culture (which endeared me to my Boomer professors), going to class barefoot and late, smoking a lot of weed--which hey! made me feel less awkward but definitely didn't help my GPA! Eventually I graduated with no plan whatsoever bc that just wasn't a thing most of the kids here had to worry about--room in the family biz! I wandered into grad school to rack up more debt for more ultimately useless degrees.
I've made plenty of bad choices, but I'm still mad that no grownups helped. I was smart and funny so clearly fine. But I was not fine. And I've not given a single dime to those requests for money that come every month. I see the request signed with the name of some sorority sister that supported those vile frat boys that came to our Take Back the Night rallies to jeer and protest (protest!) and toss it right in the can.
Anyway. Thanks for sharing this. It resonated and stirred up some shit I'm going to need to think about.
Deana, what did you end up doing? Why are schools releasing kids into the world with no info on financial survival? No plan? And if you're an art history major all the more reason for your 400,000 four year degree to know how you're going to get a job? In my parents era they had home economics...let's bring that back and let's tell the schools they need to give the middle class more financial help. They need it! So glad you shared your experience.
I went to grad school, thinking I’d be a professor bc I just could imagine what I could do with an American Studies degree (again: zero guidance). When it became clear that teaching was NOT for me and that academia required skills I simply did not have (self promotion, networking), I…got pregnant. And then again. And once more. I was one of those over-educated stay at home moms, super involved (helped found the public Montessori school my kids went to) and driving carpool. I cobbled together a part time job as a a catering bartender and I taught sewing, cooking, and art to homeschool kids and finally, once they went off to STATE colleges, I got a jo at the public library and I’m happy as a clam. Thanks for asking!
Such a female journey! Just the way it is for a lot of women I know. Overeducated and underemployed but spent 20 plus years momming and now with the kids moving on some of us are really enjoying this period of experimentation. So glad you are!
This article, one of the most important I've ever read in my 54-odd years of adult reading, sheds a lot of light on why life is so hard for people with little money, as well as why people are so much happier in Scandinavian countries, which have solid social safety nets, which in Finland, includes half a year's paid leave for both parents after a baby is born (see: the Nordic Theory of Everything by Anu Partenan). https://www.harvardmagazine.com/2015/04/the-science-of-scarcity
The article is actually almost 9 years old. I'd lost it, and recently I was feeling like it was more important than ever. So I called Harvard Magazine, and they got me someone who was able to find it, and send it to me. I immediately sent it to my email list of more than 70. And since then, I've been sharing it at every opportunity. I've actually never been in the situation you spent all to much of your life in, thanks to having inherited a cushion in the first couple of years I was on my own, but I think it may have been reading about your trials and tribulations over money that motivated me to find that article again.
I related to this so much. I was the first in my (Australian) rural working class family to go to university in a big city where l hardly knew anyone and it was daunting and difficult. l felt very inferior to all the city kids who seemed so confident and used words like 'nebulous'. It didn't help that in one of my first sociology classes we were asked to raise our hands if we identified as working, middle or upper class, and only l and another student identified ourselves as working class!
Oh wow. This is so important and so true. It was true in the 1980s when I went off to college and it is true in today’s US (as I hear from nieces, nephews, children of friends). I now live in Switzerland, and my son was born and raised here. No one is allowed to finish their education without a plan here (which has its disadvantages, too, but that is a different topic).
I remember getting a scholarship to a fancy summer music camp when I was in high school: intense orchestral training with amazing musicians. I loved it. I had two roommates— a double-bass playing scholarship girl, and a poor-little-rich-girl clarinetist who was there because her family needed to park her somewhere when her boarding school closed for the summer. We three were inseparable, sharing clothes (Nikki was happy to swap her cashmere for a “vintage” sweatshirt), cigarettes, drinks… because everyone went out for drinks with the profs after practice. (Back then, the drinking age was 18, so we were all close enough. And no bars in the midwestern town would refuse entry to the musicians accompanied by their adult teachers.)
There were plenty of hi-jinks that summer. The boys wired a counsellor’s bed with firecrackers (the subsequent fire was extinguished quickly, no one was injured). A food fight in the cafeteria started by the younger (12-14) campers. Being out past curfew shooting pool. These resulted in finger-wagging lectures, because everyone knew we were all very talented and driven and young and had to let off steam somewhere.
One tipsy night, we three girls decided to steal a street sign: Iowa Street. One shimmied up the pole to unscrew the sign, one smuggled it back under her jacket, and the contraband was hidden under my bed.
The administration decided to draw the line. The two scholarship girls were sent home.
I was angry at having the music and the concert appearances taken from me. I was ashamed in front of my parents. And I was desperate over the unfairness of it all. That was my first lesson in where the lines are drawn.
Terrific post
Thanks, David!
Great piece. As someone who grew up comfortably upper middle class, and attended a small well-regarded liberal arts college, it was eye-opening to meet so many individuals like Ms. Stine. It was an important part of my education as a human being that had nothing to do with books or lecture halls.
On another note, just watched your interview on CBS. Very sweet. I do love a happy ending!
Ha, thank you!
I graduated from a "little Ivy" in 1989. My family was lower middle class, usually kind of broke but not actually poor. The college I imprinted on like a privileged duckling offered me zero financial aid in spite of the fact that my dad managed a KMart and my mom had only just gone back to work as a teacher. They had three children younger than I still at home; we grew most of our own food; my sense of style had been defined by pretending I WANTED to shop at thrift stores bc it was cooler. Still, no scholarships for me. I didn't know how to find the ones other than what the college offered--didn't know that was a thing, in fact! My parents didn't say "no, this is stupid expensive and we cannot afford it," they took on debt, I took on debt (with no idea what it actually meant) and off I went.
I had no idea how to study because I was smart enough to just fake it in high school. good grades with no effort. College was a rude awakening and I'd have lost any scholarships I'd gotten with a GPA requirement. I had no idea how to relate to these kids that had spent summers at camp and had add-a-bead necklaces and the money for textbooks. I reacted to the Young Reaganites by embracing hippie culture (which endeared me to my Boomer professors), going to class barefoot and late, smoking a lot of weed--which hey! made me feel less awkward but definitely didn't help my GPA! Eventually I graduated with no plan whatsoever bc that just wasn't a thing most of the kids here had to worry about--room in the family biz! I wandered into grad school to rack up more debt for more ultimately useless degrees.
I've made plenty of bad choices, but I'm still mad that no grownups helped. I was smart and funny so clearly fine. But I was not fine. And I've not given a single dime to those requests for money that come every month. I see the request signed with the name of some sorority sister that supported those vile frat boys that came to our Take Back the Night rallies to jeer and protest (protest!) and toss it right in the can.
Anyway. Thanks for sharing this. It resonated and stirred up some shit I'm going to need to think about.
Extremely thoughtful response, thank you so much.
Deana, what did you end up doing? Why are schools releasing kids into the world with no info on financial survival? No plan? And if you're an art history major all the more reason for your 400,000 four year degree to know how you're going to get a job? In my parents era they had home economics...let's bring that back and let's tell the schools they need to give the middle class more financial help. They need it! So glad you shared your experience.
I went to grad school, thinking I’d be a professor bc I just could imagine what I could do with an American Studies degree (again: zero guidance). When it became clear that teaching was NOT for me and that academia required skills I simply did not have (self promotion, networking), I…got pregnant. And then again. And once more. I was one of those over-educated stay at home moms, super involved (helped found the public Montessori school my kids went to) and driving carpool. I cobbled together a part time job as a a catering bartender and I taught sewing, cooking, and art to homeschool kids and finally, once they went off to STATE colleges, I got a jo at the public library and I’m happy as a clam. Thanks for asking!
Such a female journey! Just the way it is for a lot of women I know. Overeducated and underemployed but spent 20 plus years momming and now with the kids moving on some of us are really enjoying this period of experimentation. So glad you are!
The libraries are full of us, lol
This article, one of the most important I've ever read in my 54-odd years of adult reading, sheds a lot of light on why life is so hard for people with little money, as well as why people are so much happier in Scandinavian countries, which have solid social safety nets, which in Finland, includes half a year's paid leave for both parents after a baby is born (see: the Nordic Theory of Everything by Anu Partenan). https://www.harvardmagazine.com/2015/04/the-science-of-scarcity
I'm so glad it spoke to you.
Likewise, Deborah.
The article is actually almost 9 years old. I'd lost it, and recently I was feeling like it was more important than ever. So I called Harvard Magazine, and they got me someone who was able to find it, and send it to me. I immediately sent it to my email list of more than 70. And since then, I've been sharing it at every opportunity. I've actually never been in the situation you spent all to much of your life in, thanks to having inherited a cushion in the first couple of years I was on my own, but I think it may have been reading about your trials and tribulations over money that motivated me to find that article again.
I related to this so much. I was the first in my (Australian) rural working class family to go to university in a big city where l hardly knew anyone and it was daunting and difficult. l felt very inferior to all the city kids who seemed so confident and used words like 'nebulous'. It didn't help that in one of my first sociology classes we were asked to raise our hands if we identified as working, middle or upper class, and only l and another student identified ourselves as working class!
Oh, wow. Yeah, that must have been hard.
Oh wow. This is so important and so true. It was true in the 1980s when I went off to college and it is true in today’s US (as I hear from nieces, nephews, children of friends). I now live in Switzerland, and my son was born and raised here. No one is allowed to finish their education without a plan here (which has its disadvantages, too, but that is a different topic).
I remember getting a scholarship to a fancy summer music camp when I was in high school: intense orchestral training with amazing musicians. I loved it. I had two roommates— a double-bass playing scholarship girl, and a poor-little-rich-girl clarinetist who was there because her family needed to park her somewhere when her boarding school closed for the summer. We three were inseparable, sharing clothes (Nikki was happy to swap her cashmere for a “vintage” sweatshirt), cigarettes, drinks… because everyone went out for drinks with the profs after practice. (Back then, the drinking age was 18, so we were all close enough. And no bars in the midwestern town would refuse entry to the musicians accompanied by their adult teachers.)
There were plenty of hi-jinks that summer. The boys wired a counsellor’s bed with firecrackers (the subsequent fire was extinguished quickly, no one was injured). A food fight in the cafeteria started by the younger (12-14) campers. Being out past curfew shooting pool. These resulted in finger-wagging lectures, because everyone knew we were all very talented and driven and young and had to let off steam somewhere.
One tipsy night, we three girls decided to steal a street sign: Iowa Street. One shimmied up the pole to unscrew the sign, one smuggled it back under her jacket, and the contraband was hidden under my bed.
The administration decided to draw the line. The two scholarship girls were sent home.
I was angry at having the music and the concert appearances taken from me. I was ashamed in front of my parents. And I was desperate over the unfairness of it all. That was my first lesson in where the lines are drawn.