This story from Vice about Harvard shows the sad state of affairs across the working world in North America. Harvard is doing the “great service” for it’s student workers of showing them resources to help them pay for things, like food. They want to be congratulated for this, while we look the other way as they continue to pay student workers so little they can’t afford food.
Remember, Harvard has $50 million dollars in it’s endowment under management. It could afford to pay each of the student workers enough to pay for a modest apartment, and have money for food. I simply chooses not to.
Maybe it’s like NCAA “student” athletes, who were supposed to be students first and athletes second. Sure the University could benefit from having some big personality, but the individual athlete couldn’t make a penny off their success1.
It would seem that Harvard feels students should be so poor they can barely afford food.
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- Yes this changed recently. ↩