From The Hunter Word
Some students who feel financially stable despite the falling economy nevertheless worry about the negative effects of the crisis in their communities.
Suhatcha Panya, 23, an environmental sociology major in CUNY’s baccalaureate program known as CUNY BA, said she was not directly impacted. The baccalaureate program allowed her to create her own degree track in interdisciplinary studies. Panya said she worried that the crisis would cause CUNY tuition to rise, but her employment was unaffected.
“I work in a job where there are no pay cuts,” said Panya, who wore a flashy green jumper over gray stockings, as she ate a slice of pizza in the Hunter West cafeteria. As the secretary to a chiropractor in midtown, her daily routine remains the same, but she expressed concern about the changes in her work environment. “My boss is affected. He lost a huge chunk of his client base. They think of seeing a chiropractor as a luxury, especially since many were laid off and lost their health insurance,” she said.
Panya also said that she was “morally supportive” of a friend who was laid off from his job at Roman & Littlefield publishing company last December. She said she witnessed how difficult it was to find employment in the current market while helping him search for job openings on Craigslist and coming back empty handed. Her friend was unemployed at the time of the interview.
Rebecca Breech, a double major in English and linguistics, who was interviewed outside of Hunter’s Reading and Writing Center in Thomas Hunter Hall where she works part-time, said the Center was affected by the crisis, but only the hours of full time staff were reduced. Breech was dressed in black high-heeled boots, as she said that the daily updates on the stimulus bill made her wonder “who will bail me out?”
Shifat Salim, a freshman who has yet to pick a major, said that he was laid off from Jamba Juice two months ago. Dressed in a plaid button-down shirt and jeans as he ate a cookie from the nursing student bake sale, Salim said that he had been unsuccessfully searching for a job ever since. “It’s a tough market,” he said. Although he said he didn’t notice many changes in his neighborhood, a section of Brooklyn that is just south of the Greenwood Cemetery, Salim said he feared that students who were not directly affected now will face harsh realities once they graduate.
Other students interviewed said they had been struggling financially long before disaster hit New York, the country, and the rest of the world. Michael Brody and Milesska Contreras, unemployed English majors, said they were having just as much trouble finding a job now as they were before the crisis. Contreras said it was simply difficult for students to line up non-retail jobs before graduation. “Who is going to hire us?” she asked rhetorically.
Mohammed Khan, a sophomore biochemistry major, said that he did not have a job before the crisis and was not affected directly. However, Khan said that he noticed the reverberations of the crisis in smaller ways. “They run out of coffee at McDonald’s now,” he said, “because no one is going to Starbucks.”
Even students interviewed, whose jobs have not been unaffected by the crisis, seemed very concerned about balancing the cost of their education with other necessities, especially with the CUNY tuition hikes scheduled to begin in September. Breech, who lives on Hunter’s Brookdale campus on the lower East Side of Manhattan, said she chose textbooks over other personal items this semester. “You don’t notice how expensive books are until the price of other things go up,” she said.
Shawnee Tannenbaum, a senior majoring in English, said she was not affected directly by the recession and neither was her family. However, the financial conditions of the city indirectly impact on her spending. “Since I am surrounded by a world that is affected, I have become more conscious,” said Tannenbaum, who was dressed in a crisp, white, button-down.
Interviewed outside of the 59th street N station on Manhattan’s Upper East Side, on her way home to Astoria, Queens, Tannenbaum said that she found herself “researching the lowest price on the best cheap humidifier for hours and hours without buying one.”
The most affected students may be those who depend on their parents’ economic support, said Contreras, interviewed outside of the office of Envoy, an independent student news operation. Dressed in a purple sweatshirt and Converse sneakers, Contreras said that her father, who works as a press operator at Rikers, lost his overtime hours because of the crisis and that meant less weekly pay.
“It’s because of this that we pay some bills late and struggle to even pay my tuition,” she said. Brody, who was interviewed in a gray sweater and jeans, leaning against a wall in Thomas Hunter Hall, said he was bothered by television commercials that he believed exploited the crisis, the ones that “pretend that they’re breaking news when all they are doing is telling you about a timeshare in Utah.”
Jeremiah Murphy, a 23-year-old junior wearing a three-piece suit, said his community in Astoria, Queens, was thriving and expanding rather than struggling. “New business seem to be coming in all over the place,” said Murphy, “and pre-existing companies seem to be upgrading to keep up with the surrounding growth.”
However, Contreras said the negative effects of the recession were very visible in her West Bronx community. She said there weren’t as many HELP WANTED signs in store windows, and many businesses, small and large, have closed.
Khan also said he noticed visible effects of the crisis in Marine Park, Brooklyn, where he lives with his family. Interviewed by the Hunter West third-floor cafeteria and wearing a long black coat and blue beanie hat, Khan also said that many stores and restaurants have closed in Marine Park, including “Marine Perk”, a coffee shop modeled after the hangout in the TV show Friends. “Hopefully, Obama will take care of it,” he said of the crisis at large.
Rosenfeld, who lives in midtown and was wearing a black dress designed by her father, said she saw numerous sales in retail shops, like Searle on 60th Street and Madison, but has also seen a rise in the cost of necessary items like groceries.
Breech said she has not seen many changes on the Upper East Side. “I walk right down Madison Avenue and there are still so many rich people buying frivolous and expensive things for seemingly no reason,” she said. “All in all, it looks like New York City’s consumerism culture, at least for the most elite, is still thriving.”
“Hopefully Obama’s new plans help save America some money,” said Rosenfeld. “I’m really glad he put limits on bonuses, but more must be done, especially for the 3 million people who lost their jobs.”
Murphy also expressed optimism that the economy was cyclical and that it could most likely straighten itself out.
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