imagine sOmeOne's paying attentiOn

Imagine a headline "Upper Income Households Paying Too Much of Monthly Budget for Housing."

Yeah, right. But I am guessing that if upper income households were forced to cope with budget busting housing costs, skyrocketing utility bills, soaring food prices, off the charts transportation expenses, well, things would be different.

Back to reality. Yet another report (one could wonder how many reports are needed to convince lawmakers of a problem??) documents the extreme burden low income households face in keeping that household--as in avoiding homelessness. University of Chicago's Chapin Hall released the report that bodes ill for over 18 million households.

The mortgage crisis is just the tip of the iceberg, according to Chapin's researchers who illustrate the bigger problem.

Many families are paying a large percentage of their income on housing, leaving little money for other necessities such as food, clothing, and health care.

Now, that sounds almost benign--unless you are one of those households making decisions on how to divvy up the paltry monthly income. And to add a painful dose of reality, the researchers documented a sobering statistic...

...extremely low-income rental households...almost 3.5 million children living in families that are in this extreme financial position. (Many households with severe housing needs are elderly households.) In addition, more than 3.6 million lower-income home-owning households are in the same high-cost housing situation, adding another 3 million children...

OK, do way over 6 million children in precarious housing situations merit anyone's attention (besides the overwhelmed do-gooders out here)? Does anyone besides this little boy in a shelter have a clue?

Sure, the same point can be made about the elderly, also briefly referred to in the Chapin report, but right now I'm working so kids can have a decent chance to grow up as productive adults. And, dang, that's getting harder to do.

Think about the last time you were hungry, didn't have access to health care, couldn't get somewhere because you lacked transportation. How did that make you feel? Can you imagine what families go through when they live that way every day? Now, remember back to when you were a kid...

Silly me, I keep hoping someone from Obama's team will read these blogs--not just mine but those of my esteemed blog-mates--and chime in. Let us know help is on the way. Say something.

In the meantime, we keep hammering and yammering. If these were 6+ million upper income kids, Congress and our leaders would be over this crisis like ants at a picnic. If these were kids of pro ball players, we'd have hearings and commissions. We'd get 24 hour media coverage, ala Michael Jackson-style. But no, we just get a whimper, if that.

Seems to me that the plethora of crises (real and celeb-related) needs to get sorted out and assigned according to priority. Hmmm...that would be a telling exercise.

photos by the author