What is poverty, and how does it work? Particularly in Baltimore, where it persists and informs how we live and die. In Baltimore the same could be said for poverty. Like water to fish, we are swimming in its symbols: abandoned neighborhoods, vacant buildings, crumbling streets, broken sidewalks, but perhaps blind to its logic. Particularly in the aftermath of the death of
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Freddie Gray in police custody, when the media depicted poverty here as statistics and numbers, the result of discriminatory laws and aggressive policing, the root cause of the city's ills.
Poverty in Baltimore, Poverty in the United States, Poverty in the world, the global capitalist economy, is a catastrophe visited on poor people. And there's such a fear, there's a real trembling in the boots of elites at the top, when poor people straighten their backs up, organize, mobilize, and bring significant power and pressure to bear. In Baltimore, poverty has purpose. The idea of poverty is simple in imperative: some take more, and some get less.
The statistics are stark, but often misleading. In Sandtown-Winchester, where Freddie Gray grew up, the average life expectancy is 14 years less than the city's wealthiest neighborhood, Roland Park. The median income there, $92,000, is roughly three times higher than the $27,000 average income in Sandtown-Winchester, which is the neighborhood that includes Gilmor Homes, where Freddie was arrested. But this only tells part of the story, because hidden behind the facade of City Hall are mechanisms that make poverty work. Baltimore spends three times more on policing than it does on education, one of the highest percentages spent on law enforcement across the country.
