Income Inequality and Discrimination. Will It ever end?

"There's some folks who don't eat like us."  she whispered fiercely, but you ain't called on to contradict 'em at the table when they don't.  That boy's yo comp'ny and if he wants to eat up the table cloth you let him, you here?"

 "He ain't company, Cal, he's just a Cunningham"

"Hush your mouth! Don't matter who they are, anybody sets foot in this house's yo' comp'ny, and don't you let me catch you remarkin' on their ways like you was so high and mighty!  Yo' folks might be better'n the Cunninghams but it don't count for nonthin' the way you're disgracin' em'. "

Jem invites Walter Cunningham to their house for lunch.  While eating their meal, Walter pours tons

of molasses on his meat and vegetables which causes Scout to remark.

Personally I always side with Scout when it comes to her and Calpurnia's arguments, but this scene had me feeling more on Calpurnia's side.  I like picturing Calpurnia as wise, smart, loyal, strong, and stubborn lady.  We all need adults like her in our lives. The extra mother figures who tell us right from wrong.

This is just one of the small places in the book where income inequality is shown.  Later in the book Jem says "There's four kinds of folks in the world.  There's the ordinary kind like us and the neighbors, there's the kind like the Cunninghams out in the woods, the kind like the Ewells down at the dump, and the Negroes."  The Ewells lived by the garbage dump.  They're both poor and uneducated.  The Cunninghams paid back what they owe but not with money. The black people didn't have a lot but were happy with what they had.  The Finches were the average middle class family.     Even though this was set in the 1930s when the Great Depression hit America after the Wall Street Crash a time of harsh discrimination, I can still relate to it today.

In the United States income inequality, or the gap between the rich and the poor has been growing rapidly.  The average income of an upperclassmen is from $150,000 to $250,000 per year.  The average The average income of a person in the middle class men is anywhere between $23,050 and $100,000 per year.  The average income of a person in the lower class earns at most $18,000 per year. But does the amount of income give us the right to judge others.  NO it doesn't but it happens all the time.

Everyday I see kids of all different races getting picked on for the clothes they're wearing, the shoes they have on their feet, and we base they're appearance off of their income.  But how do we know if they're really struggling or not,  if the just don't care about the way they look.  We don't know and we shouldn't discriminate.

If I was Calpurnia I would have done the same thing to Scout.  I would have taught her how to be respectful of others and not condescending.  If I were Walter I would have stuck up for myself and explain to Scout what its really like to be a Cunningham, because its things like this that keep discrimination going.