The Mortgage and Credit Crisis Hits Day Laborers and Why You Care

Over the weekend half of Why You Care went to Home Depot to load up on dirt and other items for a few projects. Upon entering the parking lot off of Rhode Island Ave N.E. was a sight I've not seen before, at least fifty - 50 - day laborers standing around with no takers. Nothing but boredom and each other to keep themselves company. Home Depot has always been a favorite spot to hire and get hired for work. The difference between this past weekend and life before is that people were hiring. Good story, actually great story, good enough to write and pitch.

So, this morning when the New York Times did the piece I was both happy and a reader with high expectations.

Here's why you care: The Times' piece is very much about how economics is really a life or death struggle. The day laborers who stand around for the next month with no work will be dipping into their emergency funds, and soon those will be gone. What is left is a captive and vulnerable group of people. The story does a good job of showing how they get stiffed by contractors, afraid to follow up in some cases because of their immigration status. The other predator (at least for those up in Northeast Washington, D.C.) are drug gangs.

If you are a day laborer down on your luck and afraid to go to the police doesn't that make you: 1) an easy target for mugging, if someone thinks you just came from a job?; 2) possible target for drug sales if you turn to narcotics to mitigate a variety of issues?; and 3) maybe, even maybe in some cases, desperate enough to turn to selling narcotics as a last resort?

Loading up my trunk with dirt, landscaping, etc. I turned down not less than three guys wanting to work on the yard, or at the minimum load the goods into the vehicle. No one was pushy, all unfailingly polite, all hard working guys, all desperate to work hard.

The one interesting part of the news coverage over the mortgage meltdown has been the extraordinary way news has shown that the economy effects everyone. Lack of lending means lack of developing, which means lack of working, which feeds more foreclosures, which hurts the banks and property values further.

A great piece to be done here is to translate this story to TV. The other great piece to be done is to follow up with community/social services groups and ask them are they prepared to help. Why You Care would watch that piece.

Today's Times' piece might feel like a feature, but we assure that this objectively puts you ahead of the curve, because as the economy stagnates those most vulnerable will soon be very evident.