Throughout the holiday season I am astounded at what others and I will pay to make someone happy. The gifts that are purchased due to social norms are extravagant and in most instances outside of one’s personal budget. This was never made clearer to me than when a former employee of my family business told me how she intended to pay for her son’s gifts.
Apparently there are companies that pray on the misfortune of the minimum wage employees in America by allowing them to take an advance against their expected tax return so that they can have the money to buy presents. The idea that a person needs to borrow money to buy Christmas gifts should not be that foreign as most people have credit cards which in essence is doing the same thing. However, the idea of needing to borrow against future tax returns in such a distinct and planned way astounded me.
As a salary employee I know what my income will be each week and I plan my family’s budget accordingly. The knowledge of this gift getting scheme hammered in the point that not all Americans are as lucky as I am. I see employees each day who cannot afford to fix their car, pay their medical bills, or leave their child in school after being suspended because they cannot miss one hour of work. The working poor who take these jobs have no education or the wrong type of education for the available career opportunities.
It is my belief that a system which enables and possibly forces parents into a situation where they need to borrow against future income tax returns to purchase coveted Christmas gifts is corrupt and unjust. The fact that the minimum wage in this country is so low that a parent cannot afford the medical bills for his child is astounding. The class structure of our society which keeps these well meaning people down is so engrained I cannot propose a way around it. I can, however, hope that one day the rich will be poorer and the poor will be richer and parents will not have to borrow money to provide a simple Christmas gift.
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