People living in poverty experience all kinds of struggles that people who have never lived in poverty cannot even conceive of. Most obvious are the needs for consistent and safe shelter, food, and clothing for yourself and your family. But additional obstacles include obtaining stable employment, education, basic social services, health care and transportation. Even when these necessities can be obtained, keeping them long term can be a struggle in itself. The Community Action Poverty Simulation (CAPS) project runs programs that try to bridge “that gap from misconception to understanding. CAPS is an interactive immersion experience. It sensitizes community participants to the realities of poverty.”
The project has several goals, including:
1] Promote Poverty Awareness
2] Increase Understanding
3] Inspire Local Change
4] Transform Perspectives
During the simulation, participants role-play a month in the life of a real person living in poverty with their family and trying to make ends meet.
Some of our faculty (Megan Gross, Tomma Henckel, Sara Mamo and Lisa Sommers) have participated in the poverty simulation in different capacities and wanted to describe our experiences with the simulation and some take-aways.
The event took place in a large function room where everyone was assigned a name, family, and specific demographics like age, employment status, and health status. We were given detailed documentation with our financial obligations (mortgage/rent, car payment, utilities, etc.). Children had to go to school and otherwise be supervised, while workers had to go to work, cash their paychecks, and find ways to fulfill their other needs. Around the periphery of the large room were the town services, including the employer, school, bank, stores, church, welfare office, pawn shop. Transportation had to be arranged to get to these places (car or public, all of which incur costs). These were staffed by community volunteers who had previously been trained on the simulation program.
Tomma’s thoughts as a low-income citizen:
Even though the activity was less than two hours in all, the tasks gave a glimpse of some of the hardships people who live in poverty face every day all day long.
I found it very stressful to navigate all the systems, and get everything done and answered within the allotted time. The pressures to be able to attend to all the obligations (financial, food, care for the family, find childcare during school break, etc.) are excruciating.
Standing in lines and waiting was stressful and frustrating because it seemed like such a waste of time that could have been spent on getting other necessary things done.
I felt that I caught on to what services to request at the end of the activity (in the fourth week).If I had to do it over again, perhaps I would understand the system a little better. Nobody volunteered services that we may have been entitled to. We needed to know the system in order to benefit from it. In the meantime, if you weren’t in the know, you got beaten down and fell more and more behind in terms of work, schooling, financial obligations, self care, and attending to health and well-being. Getting food was hard enough, let alone prioritizing healthy and affordable food options. We had to sell our car and some of our electronics at the pawn shop to be able to pay the utilities for that month. What would have happened the following month?
My younger siblings (age 8 and 10) went to the church for services alone and were picked up by child protection services. It really brought to light how difficult it is to have to negotiate services with children in tow, for whom transportation is often an added cost. Why can a 10-year old not ride a bus alone without being reported to CPS when 12-year olds are able to babysit other children?
Family connection was important. Dividing the work and relying on each other was key. Learning the system — the rights and benefits — was tremendously important to getting ahead or simply not falling further behind. This all took so much additional energy and time. Just to hang on.
Lisa’s observations as a townsperson:
People even in the simulation became quite angry and dysregulated by the unfairness and the hidden rules…there were a couple of people who were irate and attributed this to the organization of the poverty sim itself, rather than the experience that people in poverty have all the time! It was interesting to observe this.
As a townsperson, I quickly became aware that I couldn’t handle the workload and found myself “bending the rules” because I knew people had no power over me and I had the ultimate power…I think this kind of thing happens ALL the time in healthcare with people who do not have experience with the medical system.
Some information and resources about this poverty simulation project:
Home Page – Poverty Simulation
The Poverty Simulation – Poverty Simulation
Poverty_simulation_brochure_2017.pdf (povertysimulation.net)