September 5, 2018
Page 13
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O PINION
Our Economy as a Game of ‘Monopoly’
We need to make our
country fairer
J ill r iCharDson
As a sociology profes-
sor in community college, I
have my students play Mo-
nopoly. Only, I give them a
special, rigged version.
There are five players. The wealthiest
begins with $5,500, all of the railroads, and
the two most valuable properties (Board-
walk and Park Place). The least wealthy
begins with about $200 and no property.
The remaining three are in between.
Each time the players pass Go, the
wealthiest player gets $500. The poorest
gets $30.
It doesn’t take long before the poorest
two players run out of money entirely. It’s
an unfair, boring game.
This is the game all Americans are play-
ing.
The wealthiest player’s starting as-
sets are proportional to the wealthiest 20
percent of Americans. The poorest play-
er’s starting assets are proportional to the
poorest fifth of the U.S. population. The
remaining three are proportional to the re-
maining three fifths of the country.
Likewise, the money they receive as
they pass Go is linked to the income of
by
each fifth of the U.S. population.
For the richest players in the game, it’s
probably the best Monopoly game of
their lives. For the rest, especially the
two poorest, it’s a nightmare.
I’m sick of playing this game in
real life.
Where I live, in California, about
one fifth of the population lives in
poverty, and another fifth lives just
work by living far from the beach in an
un-trendy neighborhood or suburb. Now
you can’t.
Some speculate that Airbnb is driving
up rental costs, and everyone speaks of an
“affordable housing crisis.” But nobody’s
doing anything about it.
For the wealthy, life here is great. We’ve
got beaches, mountains, desert, and year-
round good weather. For the people who
For the wealthy, life here is great.
We’ve got beaches, mountains, desert,
and year-round good weather. For the
people who serve them their food, clean
their homes, or landscape their lawns,
the cost of rent alone is strangling.
above the poverty line. And the official
poverty line doesn’t even consider the cost
of living.
Since I moved here, nearly 12 years
ago, the cost of rent has doubled. Areas
that used to be affordable no longer are.
You could once find a way to make it
serve them their food, clean their homes,
or landscape their lawns, the cost of rent
alone is strangling.
In the U.S. overall, wages haven’t kept
up with either inflation or productivity
over the years. Since 1973, productivity
has increased by 77 percent while wages
increased by only 12.4 percent. Taking
inflation into consideration, wages have
remained stagnant since the 1960s, while
most of the gains go to the wealthiest.
Average pay keeps up with cost of living
better in some parts of the U.S. than others.
California isn’t even the worst.
I watch my students try to complete a
college education while struggling to make
ends meet.
The middle class vision of parents pay-
ing for their children’s college education
and their living expenses isn’t a reality for
many students. For some families it’s the
opposite — the child works to put him or
herself through school while contributing
to the family budget.
Attending school and working at the
same time is difficult, and sometimes im-
possible. Some students attempt it while
raising children or caring for sick or elder-
ly family members. In the end, most com-
munity college students never get a four-
year degree.
We need to make our country fairer than
my rigged Monopoly game. In a game, it’s
just a bummer when the poorest players go
broke first. In life, the costs are in human
misery.
OtherWords columnist Jill Richardson is
pursuing a PhD in sociology at the Univer-
sity of Wisconsin-Madison. She lives in San
Diego. Distributed by OtherWords.org.
Schools Need Resources, Not ‘Resource Officers’
There are better
ways to keep
students safe
l iDwina b ell
After a school year marred
by shootings, districts across
the country have responded
this year with calls for more
“school resource officers” in classrooms.
As a result, many students are returning to
schools that feel more like prisons — and
in fact form a quick pipeline to real prisons.
School resource officers, or SROs, are
armed law enforcement officers who police
hallways and classrooms. They often arrest
students for minor disciplinary issues, as
a new Institute for Policy Studies report
called Students Under Siege explains.
These officers are part of the larger school-
to-prison pipeline that pushes students out
of school and behind bars.
The very students SROs are supposed to
protect are often the ones most harmed by
them. In addition to referring kids to the ju-
venile justice system, SROs have been re-
peatedly filmed violently mistreating black
and brown girls in particular.
That’s why many students say SROs ar-
en’t the answer to school shootings.
At the March for Our Lives, Edna
Chavez, a student from Los Angeles, spoke
out against adding more SROs: “Instead
by
of making black and brown students feel
safe,” she complained, “they continue to
profile and criminalize us.”
Chavez called for a different ap-
proach. “We should have a department
specializing in restorative justice,” she
said. “We need to tackle the root caus-
es of the issues we face, and come to
an understanding on how to resolve
them.”
They address the harms together and try to
arrive at a solution.
A growing number of school districts
nationwide, from Oakland, Calif. to Wash-
ington, D.C., are implementing these prac-
tices.
When there’s a conflict, participants
meet to discuss the circumstances, iden-
tify the support they need, and consent to
a healing process. They talk until they ar-
When there’s a conflict, participants meet
to discuss the circumstances, identify the
support they need, and consent to a healing
process. They talk until they arrive at a mutual
understanding of why the harm occurred and
agree on steps toward addressing it to
everyone’s satisfaction.
Restorative justice (or RJ) treats inci-
dents in which people are harmed (like,
say, school fights) as requiring healing
rather than punishment. It focuses on the
actual harm that occurred and the need for
healing, rather than on the breaking of a
rule.
When an incident arises, the parties
come together for a restorative circle that
includes students, staff, community mem-
bers, and a restorative justice practitioner.
rive at a mutual understanding of why the
harm occurred and agree on steps toward
addressing it to everyone’s satisfaction.
Ta-Biti Gibson, a restorative justice co-
ordinator in Oakland, told NPR how re-
storative justice changes the way students
approach conflict in his school: “Instead of
throwing a punch, they’re asking for a cir-
cle, they’re backing off and asking to me-
diate it peacefully with words.”
When two students got into a fight at
Gibson’s school, the students “circled up”
and agreed to write and put up anti-bully-
ing posters, participate in after-school ser-
vice, and do joint morning announcements
with tips on how students can get along
better.
At the Duke Ellington School of the
Arts in Washington, D.C., this restorative
process is led by the students themselves.
By using a restorative approach, the stu-
dents aren’t only held accountable for their
actions — they get an opportunity to con-
tribute to a safer and more inclusive school
community. This opportunity is missed
when SROs get involved.
Resource officers are a resource only
by name. What would it look like if our
schools were actually resourced?
In a well-resourced school, students
are safe because staff can invest in their
well-being. “Accountability” isn’t separat-
ed from a student’s ability to heal, thrive,
and uplift the whole community. And stu-
dents don’t wind up in jail or with a record
for routine school incidents.
One SRO can cost up to $97,000. Instead
of hiring officers that see students as crim-
inals, schools can use that money for real
school resources — mental health work-
ers and restorative justice practitioners, to
name a few — who build students up rather
than push them out.
Lidwina Bell is a Next Leader at the In-
stitute for Policy Studies. Distributed by
OtherWords.org.