At age 21, Zackree Kline works at a funeral home and as a waiter, 60 hours a week to make ends meet — a situation that is motivating him to vote for Republican Donald Trump in November.
“I work every day of the week. I never have a day off,” Klein told AFP at a restaurant in York, a city of 45,000 in Pennsylvania.
Pennsylvania is among seven key battleground states that could decide the 2024 presidential election. While it was once reliably Democratic, the race is tight these days.
Trump and his Democratic rival Kamala Harris have campaigned repeatedly in the eastern state.
“I’ve had two jobs, actually, probably about three and a half years now,” Klein said.
But she added: “Luckily, I love both of my jobs, so I don’t have a problem working too often.”
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“A lot of people here have two plus jobs,” he said.
Kline blames the higher cost of living, with the United States experiencing a spike in inflation following the coronavirus pandemic.
He usually sleeps just five hours a night, adding: “It’s been hard to find a balance, but you have to do what you have to do to get by.”
He considers himself lucky to have some savings and was able to buy a house recently.
“I know a lot of people are still pro-Trump, just because everything was so much lower when he was president,” he said.
Trump won York County with about 60 percent of the vote in both 2016 and 2020.
“safety net”
As of August, 5.3 percent of U.S. workers held multiple jobs, according to Labor Department data.
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This translates to 8.5 million people and the level is comparable to that of 2019.
“It’s not surprising that to supplement household income, you would see people going out and getting a second job,” said Mike Folkender, an economics professor at the University of Maryland.
Faulkender, a former Treasury Department official under the Trump administration, added: “If it’s a result of economic pressure, you’d think that would bode poorly for the party that currently holds the White House.”
For 30-year-old high school math teacher Brianna Smith, a second salary working 12-25 hours a week at a supermarket provides a “safety net.”
Teaching full-time is “exhausting” financially, but “sometimes it’s like I need both incomes,” she said.
“Inflation, of course, definitely made me collect more,” she said of her hours.
Smith hopes to soon be able to work just one job, saying her students take up “a lot of my energy.”
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As for improving her financial situation, she says she doesn’t think either presidential candidate is better than the other.
A way of life
In the late 1990s, rates of multiple job holders were “much higher,” said economist Elise Gould of the Economic Policy Institute.
For some workers like Gary Jones, it “became part of my lifestyle as well.”
Five days a week, from 8:00 A.M. to 4:00 p.m., maintains the grounds of the York YMCA.
Then, until 21:30 or 22:00, he works in the warehouse of a parcel delivery company.
“It’s just making the extra money. You know, the way the economy is, what gas costs you today,” the 58-year-old said.
Jones has seen inflation drive away small businesses in recent years, adding, “The stores that were family-owned or the restaurants that were family-owned don’t exist anymore.”
While he did not reveal who he plans to vote for in November, he said: “We pray that they make the right decision, that they do the right thing.”
Source: AFP