This is me
I saw this article today at MPR and it's eerie how much my life resembles the life of the lady described. Here's a bit of the article ...
Rural Health: Financial Insecurity Plagues Many Who Live With Disability
Carol Burgos is worried her neighbors think she is bringing the neighborhood down. .... Burgos is in her early 50s. She can't mow her lawn herself because of pain and physical limits related to her osteoarthritis, degenerative disk disease and other health issues. She was deemed disabled in 1997 and lives on payments from Social Security Disability Insurance. She gets health coverage through Medicare.
She also can't afford to pay someone to mow the lawn for her. "I don't want another bill," she explains. "I don't want to be in more debt. I'm embarrassed. I don't know, who do you ask?"
Burgos estimates she is $30,000 in debt. That's a lot, especially with so little coming in. "Less than $1,500 a month," she says. "And that doesn't include [costs of] fuel; cooking gas; electric; water usage."
For food, she gets a bit of money in food stamps every month. Her income works out to about $18,000 a year — not too far off from what most people living on disability benefits make.
There's no way she could pay a $1,000 expense right away, Burgos says. According to a recent poll NPR conducted with the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, 49% of rural Americans couldn't afford a sudden expense of that size.
The percentage was much higher — 70% — for people who, like Burgos, have disabilities ..... That cycle of poor health and poverty hits people with disabilities particularly hard. "Their poverty levels are over two times higher, compared to those without disabilities," says Bill Erickson of the Yang-Tan Institute on Employment and Disability at Cornell University ...
Like this lady, I have a disability too ... legal blindness ... for which I receive Social Security. The amount I receive is a little less than she gets. My medical insurance is Medicare and Medicaid. I have debt - credit card debt - that I could probably never pay off if I lived to be 1,000 years old. My yard and house also look dilapidated because I don't have the physical ability or the money to do all that need to be done. Thank God I can still mow the lawn.
I actually feel ashamed to post this. People like me are embarrassing. If only we had tried harder, been luckier, just been better, we wouldn't now be social parasites. Sorry - I get somewhat bitter at times ;) As I listen to the Democratic candidates for the 2020 elections, I hope in vain for one of them to talk about people like me. But they only mention the middle class, the working class. They believe we who are near poverty or in it don't vote. They believe the "real" voters will resent any talk of entitlements for the unfortunate, so they leave us out. So depressing - if the Democratic party won't help us, then who?
Rural Health: Financial Insecurity Plagues Many Who Live With Disability
Carol Burgos is worried her neighbors think she is bringing the neighborhood down. .... Burgos is in her early 50s. She can't mow her lawn herself because of pain and physical limits related to her osteoarthritis, degenerative disk disease and other health issues. She was deemed disabled in 1997 and lives on payments from Social Security Disability Insurance. She gets health coverage through Medicare.
She also can't afford to pay someone to mow the lawn for her. "I don't want another bill," she explains. "I don't want to be in more debt. I'm embarrassed. I don't know, who do you ask?"
Burgos estimates she is $30,000 in debt. That's a lot, especially with so little coming in. "Less than $1,500 a month," she says. "And that doesn't include [costs of] fuel; cooking gas; electric; water usage."
For food, she gets a bit of money in food stamps every month. Her income works out to about $18,000 a year — not too far off from what most people living on disability benefits make.
There's no way she could pay a $1,000 expense right away, Burgos says. According to a recent poll NPR conducted with the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, 49% of rural Americans couldn't afford a sudden expense of that size.
The percentage was much higher — 70% — for people who, like Burgos, have disabilities ..... That cycle of poor health and poverty hits people with disabilities particularly hard. "Their poverty levels are over two times higher, compared to those without disabilities," says Bill Erickson of the Yang-Tan Institute on Employment and Disability at Cornell University ...
Like this lady, I have a disability too ... legal blindness ... for which I receive Social Security. The amount I receive is a little less than she gets. My medical insurance is Medicare and Medicaid. I have debt - credit card debt - that I could probably never pay off if I lived to be 1,000 years old. My yard and house also look dilapidated because I don't have the physical ability or the money to do all that need to be done. Thank God I can still mow the lawn.
I actually feel ashamed to post this. People like me are embarrassing. If only we had tried harder, been luckier, just been better, we wouldn't now be social parasites. Sorry - I get somewhat bitter at times ;) As I listen to the Democratic candidates for the 2020 elections, I hope in vain for one of them to talk about people like me. But they only mention the middle class, the working class. They believe we who are near poverty or in it don't vote. They believe the "real" voters will resent any talk of entitlements for the unfortunate, so they leave us out. So depressing - if the Democratic party won't help us, then who?
posted by crystal | 12:01 PM
2 Comments:
That sucks, Crystal. I'm sorry. I don't see how anyone gets by if all they have is disability income. One of my friends has an adult son who is wheelchair bound. But he can't even get disability because the doctors can't agree on a diagnosis. We need to do better.
Thanks. I'm actually one of the luckier people because I had worked enough quarters before my vision got bad to qualify for straight social security instead of SSI (Supplemental Security Income) which is less and tied to state funding. Most people deemed "blind" by the government have never worked at all.
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