Letters to Pete: “It’s really expensive being poor.”

By Tanisha H., SC

Every day, Pete Buttigieg receives letters from Americans who believe we need a new approach to solve our nation’s biggest challenges. This is one of them.

Dear Mayor Pete,

I have a family of five including my husband and three children.

My story personifies a quote I’ve lived with all my life: it’s really expensive being poor. Wages are never enough when working full time. Neither is time nor resources to do much about it and so my family has struggled while working for companies that aren’t equipped with the care or financial support to help those that truly want to experience a life of wealth that can only be dreamt of through the eyes of the rich.

It costs more to work for someone else in more ways than just a routine of the dreaded 9 to 5. It requires the bending over backwards to arrange your life in such a way that you don’t even have time (and unfortunately money) to actually live it. Instead, we survive it. As a result, my family and I have been placed into the position of entering entrepreneurship in order to secure our future with reduced struggle. My husband is a personal chef and I am a board game developer. Both trying to make it from day to day. Black women make 61 cents for every dollar a white man makes and it shows on the dining room tables, not to mention the emotional states of our families.

I am asking for Black women to have access to capital for businesses as well as more programs to assist entrepreneurs maintain their basic rights as Americans such as renters assistance, healthcare and assistance to combat food insecurity in a better way.

Thank you for your time and I look forward to seeing change in the near future. Hopefully, with your help.

Best regards,

Tanisha H.

Pete Buttigieg is committed to closing the racial and gender pay gaps by investing in Black woman entrepreneurs. To learn more, read his plan.