How Much Money Do You Need To Earn For Affordable Housing In YOUR Community?

The National Low Income Housing Coalition has a nifty calculator on their website that shows how much you need to earn in order to afford your rent--without spending more than 30% of your income on housing. 

In Oregon, for example, the average studio apartment is $600 per month. According to the calculator, you would have to earn $11.54 per hour/$24,000 per year to afford that rent without spending more than 30% of your income on housing. The minimum wage in Oregon is $8.95/hr. Do the math.

This is why bills such as Sen. Harkin-Rep. Miller's Fair Minimum Wage Act are such sick jokes, and nothing more than posturing bills to create the illusion of actually doing something. According to Rep. Miller: 

"Miller and Harkin’s proposal would raise the minimum wage to $10.10 an hour from its current $7.25—in three steps of 95 cents—then provide for automatic annual increases linked to changes in the cost of living. Miller and Harkin’s bill would also gradually raise the minimum wage for tipped workers—which currently stands at just $2.13 an hour—for the first time in more than 20 years, to 70 percent of the regular minimum wage."

So it will take three years to get to $10.10 in 2016. Why is this a sick joke? For two reasons: 1) The minimum wage would be $10.70 TODAY if it had kept up with inflation. 2) Due to inflation, costs will be higher in three years. So that $10.10, which already falls short if it was enacted TODAY, will come up even shorter in three years.

Meanwhile, the Washington Post reports that since the recession, income for the top 1% has increased, while everyone else's income has declined:

"Wealth inequality widened dramatically during the first two years of the economic recovery, as the upper 7 percent of American households saw their average net worth increase 28 percent, while the wealth of the other 93 percent declined, according to a report released Tuesday." 

"The study by the Pew Research Center underscored other data showing that the economic growth that has followed the Great Recession has benefited mainly those at the top. The uneven recovery has only accelerated a decades-long trend of growing wealth inequality in the country, despite rising popular and political awareness of the dynamic."

So the corrupt and unfair system continues to flourish unabated. George Carlin was right--it's a big club, and you ain't in it. 

Car Living When There's No Other Choice is Now Available on Amazon.com!

The book is finally published and on sale at Amazon.com. You can find it in paperback or in Kindle.

If you need a PDF or ePub (Apple) version, contact me and I'll send you the file.

THANK YOU KICKSTARTER BACKERS FOR YOUR AMAZING SUPPORT!

I think a picture is worth a thousand words (of thanks)...

Car Living Book Featured in Local Newspaper

The Ashland (Oregon) Daily Tidings Newspaper wrote a lovely feature on the Kickstarter Car Living book project here:

Short URL: http://ow.ly/2uBX9H

http://www.dailytidings.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20130201/NEWS02/302010303

Also, pay a visit to the National Employment Law Project webpage that shows that raising the federal minimum wage DOESN'T result in job loss, and that most low-wage employers are NOT small businesses, but, yep, you guessed it, LARGE AND VERY PROFITABLE CORPORATIONS WHO RECEIVE HUGE TAX BREAKS ON THEIR RECORD PROFITS.

Sorry to shout in large capital letters, but the myths against raising the minimum wage to something more livable (that keeps up with inflation at least), are as prevalent and inaccurate as the myths about homelessness.

Think I'm kidding? Read this article in the NY Times about homelessness and its causes. It was written in 1988—yep, a quarter century ago. Key quote:

"This weekend, Edward M. Kennedy, the Massachusetts Democrat who is chairman of the Senate Labor Committee, called the lack of affordable housing and the failure to raise the minimum wage ''a one-two punch'' that had ''devastated'' the homeless and the working poor. "

And nothing has changed. Politicians wring their hands, lacking the political courage and will to implement the obvious solutions (raising the minimum wage and offering tax breaks for people/companies who provide affordable housing, defined as charging no more than 1/4 of a person's income for rent.)

Meanwhile, the problem gets worse as the numbers increase due to inaction.

Hopeful Farm 2013 - All Produce To Be Donated to Local Food Banks

Last year we did a test/pilot organic veggie garden on a farm to see what worked best in this region (So. Oregon), and how we could produce the highest yields with the least amount of effort. The photos below attest to our success:

DURING:

A baby visitor snoops through the zuke-corn patch

All excess produce was donated to our two local food banks. We're talking at least a case each week from July through October. That's how prolific things were.

So it's with great gusto that we've been gifted use of farmland again this season to begin Farm v 2.0! Here's the humble beginnings so far:

The back section is going to be a corn field, and the six squares are going to be various veggies. The method utilized is called lasagna gardening, or sheet composting, combined with square-foot gardening. These two combined methods reduce weeding and labor while producing twice the yield of traditional row gardening. Not only that, almost all of our materials are FREE. We use manure from local stables nearby, the tires are free and so is the cardboard, which acts as a weed/grass suppressor while inviting earthworms to tunnel upward.

More to come...

Danish Blog Article About "When Car Living Is The Only Choice" Book Project

The book project was featured on a Danish design blog today. Check it out here: http://goo.gl/piMYg

Also check out the other small-space minded and compact design articles on the site. Beats McMansion-like ugliness and sprawl with ingenuity and aesthetics ever time!

Car Living When There's No Other Choice: Tips & Strategies for Survival and Safety

The project is now live over at Kickstarter.com and will run through mid-February, 2013! 

Publication is slated for June 2013.

Thank you for your support!

http://goo.gl/dLl3I

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1153660243/car-living-when-theres-no-other-choice-tips-and-st

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Living out of the back of a stationwagon (75 cubic feet) is definitely a tiny space. See how well others do with slightly larger places here: http://www.livinginashoebox.com/2013/01/tammy-is-living-in-12-m2-128-ft2-with.html

I always wanted one of those Tumbleweed Homes! They look like mansions compared to the back of a car.