Stuck in the Middle


The Rollercoaster of Status

Ginny
Trouble at Home


Downwardly Mobile


Be Careful What You Wish For

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Trouble at home

Ginny lives in a decrepit trailer in southwestern Pennsylvania with four adolescent children. Although she is desperately poor, she has chosen to avoid welfare in favor of a minimum-wage, standard job at a local chicken processing plant. Her $158 takehome pay every two weeks ensured that her electricity and gas will be cut off with some regularity, but she still feels superior to her friends who get government assistance. Meanwhile, her oldest daughter has fallen in with a middle-class set at school and makes fun of her mother for her "trashy" ways.

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All names and situations have been altered for privacy purposes.