The new faces of day labor

There but by the grace of God go I

Ken Buchanan, left, waits for work at a Home Depot Thursday morning. Most weeks he’s there six days. The most he’s made in a week: $140.

Amen.

Nothing wrong with labor of any kind.

When I started a business many moons ago, if it was very slow I'd go out and do it as a discipline.

Labor is dignified.

Pass me an Old Milwaukee, Pedro....

Tell you what...if I was in the market for short term day labor help, I’d tell Pedro to step off and take the American.

Doesn’t matter it’s all Bush’s fault.

There is an underground of sorts that is always in need of new workers. There’s not much money in it, because most of the pay is in room and board. They are the freelance caregivers.

Typically an older couple who live in the suburbs, whose children have long since moved away and can’t or won’t help, when one of the couple gets a chronic problem. The other tries to help for a while, but just gets exhausted.

The caregiver moves into an empty room, and does some household chores to give the healthy spouse a break. Things like cooking some meals and doing the dishes, taking out the trash, some vacuuming, are just a godsend.

It varies from there, as the caregiver might go shopping for them, or learn how to do some home medical work like simple injections.

The couple are often barely squeaking by themselves. Ideally, they know other people who have similar problems, so when they no longer need the caregiver, usually because one of them has died, they can pass them on to another grateful couple.

A big downside is that when someone passes away, sometimes the children who didn’t give a damn when their parents were alive suddenly become very interested in inheriting things from them. As far as they are concerned the caregiver is a thief who has already looted many valuables.

But for the most part, the children are grateful to the caregiver as well.

The reason that this is an underground is for several reasons. First of all, of course, is taxes and State regulations. Caregivers often do things they are not supposed to do, like give IVs and obtain marijuana for cancer patients.

This is, of course, tricky, but older people have no other way of getting it, and everyone who works in oncology talks about “the ‘M’ herb”. It only takes one experience of seeing a half-starved person who hasn’t been able to hold down any food for weeks, gorge themselves on food, to see that it is doing something good.

Well, that is a very small part of care giving. But it is a good way to survive when there aren’t any jobs, and room and board are more important than cash.