How much is your life worth to your country?
This is a deeply morbid question, but nonetheless, it is one that begs to be answered in a society that is so deeply corroded by capitalism such as ours.
During his campaign leading up to the 2020 election, President Joe Biden made many lofty promises to provide COVID-19 relief to residents of the United States in the form of stimulus checks, including a projection to provide each adult with $2000 by the end of 2020.
It’s now March of 2021, and we know that this, along with many other promises made by the Biden administration, has been broken.
We are entering the third month of the new year and the 12th month of the pandemic, and yet the subject of stimulus and relief money is still up for debate.
On Saturday, Feb. 27, the House of Representatives voted in favor of Biden’s current relief plan, which allots a $1.9 trillion budget towards a third stimulus check, equaling $1,400 per person among other forms of aid being given to schools, small businesses, etc.
Despite the rising number in unemployment, eviction, death and other tragedies that are being faced in the midst of a global crisis, the people in charge decided this weekend that your life is worth a single payment of about $1,400 to them.
And some don’t even think you’re worth that.
Unsurprisingly, 210 of the 213 House Republicans, in addition to two House Democrats, opposed the bill all together and voted against providing what really is the barest of bare minimum assistance to American people.
$1,400 is not enough, nor is it even close.
To put it into perspective, I am a student, and that one-time check wouldn’t even cover two months worth of my rent, which I am still on the hook for paying.
I live at school, so I am responsible for going to the grocery store and getting food for myself each week. The last time I went, a single, small container of blueberries cost me $6.
I have perfectly fine insurance, and yet I went to the doctor’s office this weekend and still paid a hefty copay for a nine-minute appointment. I pay a significant amount out of pocket for every bi-weekly therapy session I attend. Each of my monthly prescriptions costs me somewhere around $10.
And I am one of the privileged ones.
I work two on-campus jobs. I have a generous family who is always there to support me and would never leave me in a state of financial ruin because I had to make an unanticipated doctors appointment or any other run-of-the-mill necessity.
But not everyone is a 20-year-old white girl attending a nice university, who has two working, middle-class parents who are able to look out for them.
Receiving only a one-time payment of $1,400 isn’t going to break me, nor is it going to break my family, but that is because we are privileged. That narrative is nowhere close to being universal across the country.
People have and are continuing to lose their jobs on a regular basis as a result of the havoc COVID-19 has been wreaking for the last 11-and-a-half months across all facets of life. And along with job termination comes loss of healthcare, inability to make rent and so many other tragedies that some of us can’t even begin to imagine.
Even in addition to the expanded unemployment aid and certain tax breaks this new bill promises, a one-time relief payment given to those who are suffering so deeply is an utter slap in the face.
It is bad enough that the last two presidents have done little to nothing of great urgency to protect their people from destruction and the loss of lives, but by now they have repeatedly slapped a price tag on those of us who are still waiting for something to finally give way.
To circle back to the initial question of how much money you think your life is worth to the United States, it shouldn’t be that hard to estimate a number when our government continuously puts price tags on our heads every few months.
In choosing to pass a bill of this form — with 212 not even wanting to do that — U.S. politicians have shown you just how much you are worth to them. And the nauseating reality is that you’re not worth very much.
Ali Kochik is a third-year English writing major with minors in journalism and women’s and gender studies. AK908461@WCUPA.EDU