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Edwardsburg Resident Living in Poverty Relates Struggles, Hopes for the Future
The author is a resident of Edwardsburg, MI who preferred to remain anonymous. This story references common obstacles to those who face poverty everyday.

During these hard economic times everyone seems to be struggling. People are looking for any type of job that will get the bills paid. Unfortunately, I work as a server at two different restaurants and I am finding it very difficult to make ends meet no matter what I do. I currently work five days a week with the need to work more, but my schedule is so full already that I am unable to pick up extra shifts. Not only do I have two serving jobs, but I go to college, have an internship, and most importantly I have a toddler at home.

Life as a server is not easy, you have to work day and night, weekends, and holidays. We know that everyone has to eat and not everyone cooks these days, but often people forget that at the end of a meal you have to not only pay your bill, but tip your server. As a server we only make a minimum wage of $2.13 an hour and since times are tough business is slow making it so that we are only working two or three hours a shift giving us maybe four to five tables a shift if we are lucky. If you figure that each table leaves you with $5.00 then we are walking out with only $20-$25 a shift and that just is not going to pay bills when you have to pay for gas just to get to work everyday. I used to be able to bring home almost $500 a week and now I am lucky to bring home anything over $250.

I have moved in with my mother to try and make ends meet, but she needs my income to help her pay bills and I just don’t have that. I cannot even pay my bills that rack up to over $800 a month and that is not including groceries and clothes that I have to buy for my toddler. It seems that no matter what I do I am unable to get caught up and stay ahead with my bills. Servers are always going to be needed, but will always be at the low end of things because people see us as just someone to take care of them while they eat. We run around like chickens with our heads cutoff to make people happy and anymore we get nothing in return because no one can really afford to tip more than 10 percent of their bill.

Even though times are tough and people can barely make a living working as a server, I plan on finishing my education this spring and finding a job in my field. I hope to find a job sooner than my graduation date and get started on a career as soon as possible. My hope is to get started and begin working my way out of debt and in to the clear once again.

Tell us your story. Contact Kevin Lignell at klignell@haltpoverty.org.