Page 81 - Šolsko polje, XXVIII, 2017, no. 3-4: Education and the American Dream, ed. Mitja Sardoč
P. 81
p. mclaren ■ from a city on the hill to the dungheap of history
ple Hill, near Cornwall, along the St. Lawrence River and in the Unit-
ed Counties of Stormont, Dundas and Glengarry, not far from the Mo-
hawk Territory of Akwesane. Eventually, my family relocated to Toronto,
where I lived until I immigrated to the United States in 1985. I realize that
the rural/city divide is like a saber slash across the face of the American
Dream. When I think of the American Dream today, and its tragic side,
I think of the brilliant play, Sweat, by Pulitzer Prize-winning American
playwright, Lynn Nottage which addresses poverty in the U.S. and has
been described as “working-class naturalism.” Or I think of earlier plays of
Eugene O’Neil like The Hairy Ape and Arthur Miller’s, Death of a Sales-
man, and A View from the Bridge.
What are the statistics on rural and urban poverty in the United
States?
A recent survey by the Washington Post-Kaiser Family Foundation found
that two-thirds of rural residents rate local job opportunities as fair or
poor, compared with about half of urban residents. Nearly 6 in 10 ru-
ral residents encourage the youth in their communities to leave the ru-
ral areas and head to cities in order to find more opportunities for a better
life. The Great Recession of 2008 hit rural areas very hard, and these ar-
eas still have not recovered, with the total number of jobs down 128,000
from pre-recession levels. While it is true that suburban and urban coun-
ties have each gained about 3 million jobs, according to an analysis of Bu-
reau of Labor Statistics data, these jobs don’t pay much, and large num-
bers of people are living at the poverty level. The rural unemployment rate
5.3 percent while in the urban centers it’s about 4.8 percent. But in rural
areas the workforce is in decline as people just give up or move to the cit-
ies, while the workforce has grown in suburbs and cities.
But Census Bureau data reveal that the poverty rate in both cities
and urban areas is similar, about 16 percent in cities and 17 percent in rural
areas. What made Trump so popular in the rural areas is because residents
there believed that the problems that were affecting them the most could
be remedied with infrastructure investments, better trade deals, the de-
portation of undocumented immigrant workers, lower business taxes and
more market liberalization, that is, more deregulation of the economy.
More rural residents believe that people of color receive unfair privileges,
and they believe that the government is giving minority groups a free ride,
like food stamps, and so there is great mistrust in the government and
more belief in free enterprise. According to the poll, 56 percent majority
of rural residents say that the federal government treats city dwellers bet-
79
ple Hill, near Cornwall, along the St. Lawrence River and in the Unit-
ed Counties of Stormont, Dundas and Glengarry, not far from the Mo-
hawk Territory of Akwesane. Eventually, my family relocated to Toronto,
where I lived until I immigrated to the United States in 1985. I realize that
the rural/city divide is like a saber slash across the face of the American
Dream. When I think of the American Dream today, and its tragic side,
I think of the brilliant play, Sweat, by Pulitzer Prize-winning American
playwright, Lynn Nottage which addresses poverty in the U.S. and has
been described as “working-class naturalism.” Or I think of earlier plays of
Eugene O’Neil like The Hairy Ape and Arthur Miller’s, Death of a Sales-
man, and A View from the Bridge.
What are the statistics on rural and urban poverty in the United
States?
A recent survey by the Washington Post-Kaiser Family Foundation found
that two-thirds of rural residents rate local job opportunities as fair or
poor, compared with about half of urban residents. Nearly 6 in 10 ru-
ral residents encourage the youth in their communities to leave the ru-
ral areas and head to cities in order to find more opportunities for a better
life. The Great Recession of 2008 hit rural areas very hard, and these ar-
eas still have not recovered, with the total number of jobs down 128,000
from pre-recession levels. While it is true that suburban and urban coun-
ties have each gained about 3 million jobs, according to an analysis of Bu-
reau of Labor Statistics data, these jobs don’t pay much, and large num-
bers of people are living at the poverty level. The rural unemployment rate
5.3 percent while in the urban centers it’s about 4.8 percent. But in rural
areas the workforce is in decline as people just give up or move to the cit-
ies, while the workforce has grown in suburbs and cities.
But Census Bureau data reveal that the poverty rate in both cities
and urban areas is similar, about 16 percent in cities and 17 percent in rural
areas. What made Trump so popular in the rural areas is because residents
there believed that the problems that were affecting them the most could
be remedied with infrastructure investments, better trade deals, the de-
portation of undocumented immigrant workers, lower business taxes and
more market liberalization, that is, more deregulation of the economy.
More rural residents believe that people of color receive unfair privileges,
and they believe that the government is giving minority groups a free ride,
like food stamps, and so there is great mistrust in the government and
more belief in free enterprise. According to the poll, 56 percent majority
of rural residents say that the federal government treats city dwellers bet-
79
