The Poverty Spiral hasn’t changed much in decades
Unless you’re one of the 1.48 million people living in poverty in Pennsylvania, it’s difficult to know what it means to live below the poverty line.
Of that number from the U.S. Census Bureau, 13,579 live in Butler County.
Poverty can be a vicious cycle or a sudden, unexpected experience for any one person or family. To get a sense of what it is to live in poverty, participants in a United Way workshop on Tuesday, March 26, hosted at Butler SUCCEED, embodied characters in The Poverty Spiral board game, some of whom were struggling to pay day-to-day bills while others could dip into savings to pay for unexpected expenses.
The board game is based on real calls the United Way’s 211 line received from people in need, and the corporate engagement manager for the United Way of Southwestern Pennsylvania, Sherrie Dunlap Gallagher, said the game was a reflection of the lives of these individuals.
“One unexpected expense could be catastrophic, could really lead someone into a place of crisis, homelessness or any number of things,” Dunlap Gallagher said. “One car bill, one appliance goes, any of that could be kind of devastating for a family.”
The Poverty Spiral simulation was created by United Way, and different regional offices host workshops for communities to learn about populations with income challenges. On Tuesday, 10 people from community organizations participated in the workshop, where they played through the board game, then learned about how the situations they had to choose between reflected real life circumstances.
Each player was assigned a character, and each turn saw players pick up a situation card that presented a choice where players had to choose from two normally unfavorable responses. Each character had a different back story and started from a different spot on the board’s spiral-shaped path. Choices would see the players either move away from the center of the board, stay in place or fall further down the spiral.
The simulation is a reminder of an experiment performed and documented on by late author Barbara Ehrenreich, in which she lived as a single woman struggling to get by on low-wage jobs. The 2001 book, “Nickel and Dimed,” was conceived as a response to welfare reforms put in place in 1996.
Between the time the book was released and the United Way hosted its game this week, little has changed in U.S. poverty. Census Bureau numbers indicate 11.7% of Americans lived in poverty in 2001, and in 2022 that number was 11.5%. In that period, though, the U.S. population has grown by some 55 million people.
While the fight against poverty continues, it is important to support those on the front lines of the fight. The people of the United Way and Butler SUCCEED are part of that front line, and we applaud them for their efforts.
To donate or volunteer with the United Way of Southwestern Pennsylvania, visit uwswpa.org.
