Katrina Gilbert's Response To Poverty

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In the United States, 42 million women live at or below the poverty line, and 230 million children depend on them for support. Many, much like Katrina Gilbert, are the primary breadwinners of the family and rely on little assistance from others to make ends meet. Paycheck to Paycheck is the documentation of a slice of Katrina’s life, raising awareness of the struggles of women in her financial situation.
Married at nineteen, Katrina Gilbert had three children with husband Jeremy. Much of the money the couple had was funneled into Jeremy’s addiction to medication, and when they split there was little to pay for a divorce. Separated, and with Jeremy unemployed, Katrina works as a nurse’s assistant in a home for the elderly. Her job is exhausting …show more content…

While both are pleasant things on which to spend money, as someone who consistently struggles financially she should have the foresight to begin saving money so she does not have to live paycheck to paycheck for the rest of her life. Another questionable use of her money is when she goes to a hair salon to get her …show more content…

While she does deserve to spend money on herself, for someone struggling at the poverty line there are wiser investments of one’s finances.
Katrina is just one of the millions of women who strains to support herself and her children. While moving in with Chris, having Jeremy work in a sock mill, and receiving a raise

of fourteen cents more an hour are all positive changes for Katrina, they are transient and not sufficient changes to remove her from poverty. As much as she desires to work at a job which is less physically and psychologically demanding and pays higher wages, to do so she must better her education. Because Katrina’s federal aid for college was rejected, she is unable to go back to school to receive an education to better herself. The cyclic patterns of Katrina’s life reflect the principles of Keynesian economics: one must possess money in order to make money. If a person barely has enough to live, let alone invest in education, then it is nearly impossible to escape the wretches of poverty. Katrina’s story reflects the untold struggles of many women in the United States, and calls for sympathy and change for the lives and wellbeing of these

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