Could you live on $23 a week?
Published in the Kingston Whig-Standard April 1, 2006
Margaret Little knows a lot about poverty. The cheerful Queen's University political studies professor teaches a class called The Canadian Welfare State, and last month she challenged her students to live for a week on the same budget a welfare recipient would have.
I'm a student, though not at Queen's. To be precise, I'm on a placement as a student-reporter at The Whig-Standard. I soon ended up taking part in Little's assignment to her class.
"Good luck to you," she warned me by telephone. "It's not easy."
Little would soon be proven right both by her political studies class and by me.
Little gave her 55 students this assignment: Live for one week on $23.
She had calculated that since the maximum amount a single person in Kingston can collect on welfare is $536 a month, and average rent for her students is $450, they would be left with a weekly amount of only $23 to buy food and other necessities.
"I wanted them to get an idea of what the welfare rate is like to live on," she explained.
For me, the assignment was slightly modified. I would be doing it over only five days, so the amount of money I received was reduced to $16.43. My editors forbade the use of my car for the duration of the experiment, and wouldn't let me stock up on food or cigarettes in advance.
According to Little, few people on welfare have cars.
If they do, they probably can't afford insurance. Twenty-three dollars a week leaves little money for the luxury of public transit, so most of them walk.
While the money was meager, I'm an unpaid student. The experiment couldn't be that different from a normal day, could it?
For most of my life, I've been a rather big supporter of Mike Harris's "workfare" program, getting people back to work and off "the system." After all, I reasoned, why should my tax dollars go to support people who do nothing?
Granted, I'd spent a fair bit of time living beyond my means, using my share from the sale of some family-owned property to pay rent, and taking odd jobs and freelancing to cover anything else, which usually meant cigarettes, alcohol and too much fast food.
Now, it was my turn to go without.
In 2004 there were 476 people in Kingston receiving social assistance while working at part-time jobs. The current rules say a recipient is allowed to keep half of what they earn, under the earnings incentives program.
At the same time, there were 2,900 people on welfare in the Kingston area. In 2005, that number dropped to 2,844.
Day 1
Got up in the morning and walked from the downtown Kingston apartment where I've been staying to the Food Basics. For $3.81, I got a loaf of bread and a one-kilogram jar of peanut butter. If need be, I thought, I could survive a week with nothing else.
On my way out of Food Basics, I splurged and bought a 35-cent can of Master's Choice ginger ale from the vending machine. I also bummed a cigarette from someone outside the Ministry of Health on my way to The Whig office on Cataraqui Street. From the apartment where I'm staying, The Whig is about a 1.5-kilometre walk.
On arriving, I wrote up a history column that the paper runs daily, then made a peanut butter sandwich, which I washed down with the ginger ale.
I started work on a story about porta-potty thieves, but soon found myself in need of a cigarette. I walked back down Wellington Street to Smoker's Haven to see if they had anything cheap.
Sadly, they did not. I bought a pack of rolling papers for $1.25, but nothing to roll in them. I'd see what I could find after work, along with picking up a bag of potatoes.
This wouldn't be so bad if it wasn't for downtime. At least when I'm distracted, I'm not thinking about food or smoking as much. I can't imagine what it's like to actually be on welfare and not have a job for a distraction.
I could have it both ways, I realized: In 2004 there were 476 people in Kingston receiving social assistance while working at part-time jobs. The current rules say a recipient is allowed to keep half of what they earn, under the earnings incentives program.
At the same time, there were 2,900 people on welfare in the Kingston area. In 2005, that number dropped to 2,844.
Lance Thurston, commissioner in charge of Ontario Works for the City of Kingston, said many of those people have other family members to support.
"That translates to a larger number of individuals," he said. "It's shocking what we expect a number of individuals and families to live on."
Day 2
Glancing up at my computer monitor, I realized I had spoken too soon about having a job to distract me from the lack of food and nicotine.
An e-mail with the subject line "LEAVE" was waiting for me, with instructions from my editor to get out of the newsroom and go somewhere other than home. I was not to come back until 5 p.m. Joyous.
Just as well, though. I had a personal mission today: Obtain butter.
While those potatoes I spent $1.67 on the night before were good, I really wanted to fry them.
I walked to the No Frills to see what I could obtain cheaply. So instead of butter, I wound up with a bag of Granny Smith apples for $1.90.
Walking out of the store munching on an apple, I figured I'd find somewhere quiet to sit. I ended up in City Park, where I had covered a rally of the Kingston Coalition Against Poverty almost two weeks earlier.
Some people stared while others tried to avoid me with my long hair, slightly torn flannel shirt and a ski jacket I've had since high school.
Others, however, weren't fooled in the least by my charade.
The wind was harsh, but I was dressed for the mid-March weather. I had another apple while I read the paper and relaxed.
Glancing over my shoulder, I noticed a police car pulling in across the street; the officer stared at me. I guess a grubby guy on a park bench with a backpack might look like a drug dealer, but he apparently had bigger fish to fry, as he sped off a few minutes later.
I decided it was lunchtime and pulled the bag of bread and jar of peanut butter from my backpack. Just as I was doing this, a Whig photographer pulled up and rolled down his window.
"I guess I should take some pictures of you sitting around being poor," he said.
I posed for a few shots of myself eating a sandwich, before drinking the can of Faygo ginger ale I had bought at S&R for a quarter.
Some people stared while others tried to avoid me with my long hair, slightly torn flannel shirt and a ski jacket I've had since high school.
Others, however, weren't fooled in the least by my charade.
"You look far too healthy to be a smoker," said a woman from whom I'd tried to bum a smoke. She gave me one anyway.
I still had a few of my own, but they were going fast. A five-buck pack of Macdonald Specials, nasty stuff. Anything worth smoking is at least 10 bucks a pack.
Wandering downtown some more, I decided to investigate this Martha's Table place I'd heard about from our food writer.
I wasn't sure where it was so I looked for a phone book, but it seemed most phone booths in Kingston don't have them. I finally found one that did and what do you know: The page with the all the restaurants had been ripped out.
Okay, I know it looks cool when they do it in the movies, but seriously, opening a phone book to find the page you need torn out is just annoying. I finally wandered into the Holiday Inn and managed to find one there without being kicked out for looking like a slob.
Barrie Street, eh? That's not far from Queen's, where I'd be heading tomorrow. But I still had a few hours to kill, so I set off.
I arrived around 3 p.m. and discovered the restaurant is actually part of a church. It only serves on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. I took advantage of the day.
It's $1 for a three-course meal. I handed the woman at the door four quarters and she gave me a meal ticket.
Tanie Stacey, program delivery manager for Community and Family Services at the City of Kingston, recognizes the difficulty welfare recipients have keeping a proper diet, and often recommends places like Martha's Table to them.
"Those aren't long-term solutions, we realize that," she said. "But sometimes it's all we can do."
I sat at the back table, which was covered by a yellow tablecloth. There was a pitcher of water with an accompanying glass, to which I helped myself.
More people walked in. Some of them were clearly in the situation I was in, dressed half-decently but in need of cheap food. Others looked to be in far more need.
I felt like an outsider and wasn't sure what to say, so I pretty much kept my mouth shut.
The first course arrived, a hearty pork soup. I'm usually not a soup person, but this was the first full meal I'd seen since this started. I gobbled it down and waited for the main course: Beef stew, yummy. Again, I'm not much of a stew person, but this was wonderful.
Heck, I was just happy to be eating meat. It also came with a slice of bread and a small pad of butter. I asked the volunteer serving me if I might have some more and she got two more pads. Someone else at the table passed me his.
Four pads of butter. I'd be having fried potatoes soon. Mission accomplished.
Day 3
I stopped in at St. George's Cathedral in the morning for a free coffee and a cookie and smoked the last of my disgusting cigarettes while walking to the office.
I sat down and wrote the history column and then hitched a ride with a photographer to Queen's. I was there to sit in on Little's class discussion about her students' full week on welfare.
Not one student in the class got through on $23 alone.
One had a birthday, and refused to turn down the dinner her friends were taking her out to, while another had to pay for medication, which cost more than $23.
Most students, however, cited the stigma factor. They did not want to tell their friends they couldn't go out because they were "on welfare."
Trevor Irwin, a case manager for the City of Kingston, said he is aware of the stigma some recipients face and works hard to keep people who visit his office for social assistance at ease.
"When I'm with a client, I don't usually open the file for a couple of minutes and just make small talk," he said. "Obviously they don't want to be here."
The reality of living on $23 was something no one in the room at Queen's, including myself, could truly comprehend. These students were well-dressed and many had laptops and iPods, items someone living on welfare wouldn't be able to afford. Phone lines and Internet connections were also available.
Little explained that many people living on social assistance don't have phones, let alone cable or Internet.
"If your child gets sick in the middle of the night, you need a phone. If you have an abusive ex causing trouble, you need a phone to call the police," she said. "How can you go to a job interview without a phone?"
Welfare fraud was also a big issue. Once the assignment began, Little changed the message on her personal voicemail to become a sort of welfare fraud reporting line, so students could snitch on classmates they suspected of cheating.
Four messages were left identifying five students suspected of ripping off the system.
One of them was Ryan Zade. He was seen by the anonymous caller buying a cup of coffee he shouldn't have been able to afford.
"I was angry," said Zade, after being informed that he was reported. "We're all in this together and me buying a $1 cup of coffee isn't cheating."
Little said the experience highlighted a social issue.
"That's why people on welfare are so private," she explained. "People on welfare are very paranoid and they have every right to be."
Over at the Social Services building on Montreal Street, Ontario Works supervisor Michael Lanigan said he receives trivial calls about things like welfare recipients buying coffee, but he doesn't act on them. He's more concerned with paper-trail fraud, such as undeclared RRSPs.
He added that welfare fraud happens in three to five per cent of the total cases in the area, but he was "hard pressed to come up with that five per cent."
Most of the cases he's investigated, he explained, involved the recipient not knowing they were supposed to declare something.
"I think the stereotype is that it's rampant, and that's not the case anymore," said Irwin from the City of Kingston.
Back at Queen's, Jake Hason took a more conservative view on the welfare fraud investigators.
"How many fraud investigators are there?" he asked, pointing out that their salaries are paid by the government.
He suggested the money spent on investigators and legal aid lawyers to defend people accused of welfare fraud probably wastes more money than gets lost to fraud.
Once the class was over, one student flipped me a cigarette. I had mentioned during the discussion that I had no more.
I walked out and like the hobo I now was, proceeded to bum a few more smokes from people on campus. I think they were getting annoyed with me.
On my way out, I found a quarter on the ground. I had no idea I would ever sink to the level of being excited over finding a quarter. Adding to what I had left, along with two pennies I found on the ground, I had 63 cents.
I wandered into Food Basics to see what I could afford. The answer: not much. A box of imitation Kraft dinner, but that's only one meal, same with the cans of soup. Crap.
On my way back to the office, I sank to the level of poking my hand inside the change return slots of phone booths and parking machines. I got a lot of odd looks from people on the street, but no change.
Before returning to The Whig-Standard, I went into No Frills, hoping it had some other possibilities for 63 cents. There I could get packets of Kool-Aid. Each one would flavour two litres of water.
I decided to just save it, since I might even find more money later, and went back to work. Fortunately, all I had to do at work was rewrite a bunch of press releases and write my daily welfare diary. I also had to deal with my notes on Prof. Little's class.
But then, what did I see out of the corner of my eye but a box of Timbits sitting precariously on top of a filing cabinet. I made a mad lunge for it, but was quickly spotted.
Busted. Worse yet, one co-worker even had the nerve to snitch to my editor.
Now I knew how those students in Little's class felt about being ratted out.
Of course, Little wouldn't be able to say for certain if my pilfering of company Timbits was in fact welfare fraud.
One of her students asked about the free meals she gets at her part-time job, to which Little replied, "It's probably okay, but I wouldn't tell them about it."
Today was also the day the provincial budget came down, with a two-per- cent increase for welfare. That would've given me about an extra dollar for this week.
Day 4
Even after stopping at St. George's Cathedral for coffee and a muffin, I was feeling more and more lethargic. The walk to The Whig-Standard was getting longer, even though I knew there'd been no road expansion.
I had five slices of bread left and half a jar of peanut butter. Still had a few potatoes at home, which would probably be my salvation tomorrow.
I was out of cigarettes, so I needed to rely on handouts or lowering myself to ripping open butts off the ground and re-rolling the tobacco with those rolling papers I had bought the second day. I was starting to think the rolling papers were a real waste of $1.25, especially once I knew what I could get for $1.25.
It's funny; I used to justify splurging on things by saying, "Well, if an extra five bucks is going to break me, I've got bigger problems." I never once considered just what I'd do if I had those "bigger problems."
I made it through the second-to-last day, but just barely. As I was preparing to leave, I felt really lousy and was uncertain I'd even make the walk home.
I'd eaten and this didn't feel like a blood-sugar crash; I wasn't sure what it was. Maybe my immune system had been weakened and I was coming down with something.
One of my roommates later suggested my body was in shock from suddenly not eating meat.
While walking home, I went into No Frills and bought a 47-cent tub of margarine so I could fry potatoes without having to swipe butter pads.
After all the years of making comments about welfare bums "feeding off the system," I seriously needed to sit back and wonder: Who would willingly live like this?
Day 5
The last and possibly longest day of this challenge. Being Saturday, the places I had hit up for cheap or free food were closed.
I had to rely on what I had left. By afternoon, I was out of bread and I just didn't have the energy to peel any more potatoes.
I spent as much of the day sleeping as I could, getting up to bum the occasional cigarette from one of my roommates.
Apparently, this was appropriate behaviour, as a friend walked in to the apartment and saw me sprawled on the couch doing nothing. He said, "Living the true welfare life, I see. Lying on the couch and smoking all day."
I wasn't sure what this was supposed to mean, so I tried to sleep. I felt like I was eight years old again, waiting to open my Christmas presents, and this time, I started feeling guilty.
If this were the real thing, I wouldn't have had the anticipation of being hours from the end. I wouldn't even have had the anticipation of my next cheque, since rent would eat most of it and then I'd just get to go out and buy more cheap groceries.
Once I was officially allowed to spend my own money again (what little this unpaid intern had in the bank) I made a mad dash for Bubba's and ordered up a bacon cheese burger with fries and a slice of pizza to eat while I waited.
A little more than $11 for the food. Then I darted over to the Toucan for a pack of delicious du Maurier cigarettes. They came to almost $9.
In the span of about five minutes, I'd spent more than the allowance I'd received for the week.
After all the years of making comments about welfare bums "feeding off the system," I seriously needed to sit back and wonder: Who would willingly live like this?
While I was discussing poverty with a friend of mine, he argued that the average person is only one misfortune away from needing serious financial assistance.
In my case, I was one assignment away, but I realized just how hard life on social assistance could be. At the same time, I fully recognized that this was, as Little put it, "just a taste."
"One thing the students can't get a sense of is the grinding poverty," Little said.
"That's your reality every week."
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