Stocking up not an option for some.
Those living paycheck-to-paycheck struggle amid coronavirus shortages
David Allison had a fever. And he was tired. Allison never gets tired. He drives a truck all day and listens to podcasts to keep him sharp, but he rarely needs the distraction. Then he got the dry cough — and started running a fever.
It was after the novel coronavirus had officially come to Houston, and friends kept telling him: “You need a check-up.” But he didn’t have the $80 to go to Urgent Care and ask.
“It’s easier said than done,” said Allison, a 50-year-old father of two who makes $12.50 an hour without benefits as a delivery driver for a freight company. “I don’t have any money. I just don’t.”
As companies push for people to work from home and people scramble to stock up on supplies for a potential quarantine, lower-income families can’t keep up. Even a bill pushed through by Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) doesn’t cover everyone: It guarantees sick leave to some, but exempts employers with 500 or more workers. Many people without paid sick leave choose to work through an illness, because missing work means missing a paycheck that their family can’t go without: A 2017 study by the Federal Reserve Board found that 44 percent of Americans wouldn’t be able to cover a surprise $400 expense.
Allison’s wife is a server at a local sushi bar, also without benefits. Most of her income comes through tips. Combined, the family makes about $3,800 per month. Between regular bills — including $1,300 for their threebedroom house in Kingwood — they don’t have much left over. Already, regular holidays and storms put them in a tough spot. Hurricane Harvey nearly wiped them out.
The Allisons redid their bud
“By the time money does come around, store shelves are empty. It’s unheard of that I’m gonna go buy a thousand rolls of toilet paper. I couldn’t afford it.”
David Allison
get Monday. They’re behind.
That day, their 11-year-old daughter peered into the refrigerator and said, “Dad? Are you thinking about doing some shopping?”
He doesn’t want to let her know too much. He feels like he must be strong for her, his 3-year-old son and his wife.
He’s no longer feeling ill, but
when he sees his family he thinks: Was he Patient Zero? What if he infected them? How many cases are out there? He knows God is there for him, but he worries for his children.
“By the time money does come around, store shelves are empty,” Allison said. “It’s unheard of that I’m gonna go buy a thousand rolls of toilet paper. I couldn’t afford it.”
Nadia Luger, 42, wishes she could have gone to H-E-B and stocked a shopping cart full of
groceries and diapers when everyone else did, before the store limited hours and put rations on certain items. But she and her husband can’t shop until he gets home with his paycheck on Friday evenings. Then, they take the money out to pay the bills and have about $150 to $200 left to feed themselves and the two children living at home, an 18-monthold and a high schooler.
“We were OK on a daily basis but when stuff like this comes, where do we turn to?” she said.
“We can’t buy for the next three months.”
Luger’s husband works six days a week in construction, for $17.50 an hour. Luger worked as an aesthetician until her car blew a transmission in November. Her husband can’t take the time off work to fix it, and they can’t afford a mechanic. On Sundays, when he has off, she’ll take the car and do some waxings, but her clients have drifted away.
She wishes grocery stores would limit items per family (“That way when we go to get water and wipes there’s something available for everyone—not just certain people.) When she went to the H-E-B in Atascocita on Saturday, it was out of nearly everything she needed: wipes, toilet paper, milk, potatoes, frozen fruits. All she got was two gallons of water — the limit, per the store’s new rations.
She hoped to have better luck at Wal-Mart.