Inequality

The other day, while waiting at Memorial Sloan-Kettering for my medical oncologist, my wife and I sat in a row of chairs, at the end of which sat a male patient and a woman, both persons of color. Their relationship wasn’t clear. Was she his daughter? His wife? A friend? English appeared to be her native language. His English was clearly not native, although it was fluent if a bit hesitant. My nose was in a book (actually a Kindle), so I didn’t pay much attention to them, but my wife later told me what she had observed.

They had arrived three hours late for an appointment with the man’s doctor, who had already left for the day. They were late because the man had been unable to obtain transportation in time to take him to the center. He had not yet applied for the right to use the MTA’s system for disabled persons, Access-a-Ride, and therefore had to rely for transporation on the municipal shelter in which he was living. He had no means of returning to the shelter. The staff summoned a social worker, who arranged return transportation for him and explained how to apply for Access-a-Ride.

My wife told me all this as we were riding home in a taxi. Ordinarily we would have returned home by public transportation, but I had injured my foot the day before and walking was still painful. Furthermore it was pouring with an Ethiopian ferocity. So we hailed a cab.

As we rode along the East River, I couldn’t help comparing our situation with that of the man who was living in a municipal shelter, who could not pay for a long taxi ride home. It would be pleasant to assume that our good fortune was the result of our own efforts and that his misfortune was his own fault. Of course, I don’t know why he landed in a shelter. Perhaps, as my wife suggested, medical expenses bankrupted him. He was too young for Medicare and his medical insurance, if he had any, may have dropped him after he became ill.

Whatever the reason for his poverty, it’s clear that our ability to take a taxi without our having to skimp on something else had nothing to do with whatever virtues we might possess. Had we not been born to economically comfortable families that valued education and could afford to send us to elite schools, it’s doubtful that we would as privileged as we are. Life is unfair, as all the world knows, and it will ever be so. But do the inequalities have to be so great? And do they have to widen? Considering our current political gridlock, the answer to those questions, at least in the short term, is yes.

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