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These past few months, it’s grown ever harder to recognize life in America. Thanks to Covid-19, basic day-to-day existence has changed in complicated, often confusing ways. Just putting food on the table has become a challenge for many. Getting doctors’ appointments and medical care can take months. Many schools are offering on-line only instruction and good luck trying to get a driver’s license or a passport renewed in person or setting up an interview for Social Security benefits. The backlog of appointments is daunting.
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Meanwhile, where actual in-person government services are on tap, websites warn you of long lines and advise those with appointments to bring an umbrella, a chair, and something to eat and drink, as the Department of Motor Vehicles in Hudson, New York, instructed me to do over the summer. According to a September 2020 Yelp report, approximately 164,000 businesses have closed nationwide due to the pandemic, an estimated 60 percent of them for good. CNBC reports that 7.5 million businesses may still be at risk of closing. Meanwhile, more than 225,000 Americans have died of the coronavirus and, as a winter spike begins, it’s estimated that up to 410,000 could be dead by year’s end.
Then there are the signs of increasing poverty. Food banks have seen vast rises in demand, according to Feeding America, a network of 200 food banks and 60,000 food pantries and meal programs. According to a study done by Columbia University’s Center on Poverty and Social Policy, between February and September, the monthly poverty rate increased from 15 percent to 16.7 percent, despite cash infusions from Congress’s CARES Act. That report also concluded that the CARES program, while putting a lid on the rise in the monthly poverty rate for a time, “was not successful at preventing a rise in deep poverty.” And now, of course, Congress seems...
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