LA Times: Scavenging to survive in Pasadena

[ellisonz]

Scavenging to survive in Pasadena
By Anna Gorman, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
March 12, 2008

It's not yet 3 a.m. Juana Rivas grabs her shopping cart and steps off the curb into the dark.

She shields herself from the cold with a sweat shirt and jacket, along with a pink hat and gloves she bought at the 99-cent store. Only a barking dog interrupts the silence.

Rivas arrives at the first house, lifts the trash can lid and shines her flashlight inside. Nothing.

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Rivas is part of the expanding underground economy -- the hundreds of thousands of immigrants in Southern California who clean houses, mow lawns and wash dishes, making money at the margins and paying few if any taxes. Her story mirrors the contradictions that make illegal immigration such a flash point. She broke the law getting here and drains a municipal resource staying here. Yet she works hard, very hard, so her children won't have to do the same.

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-collector12mar12,0,803760.story

[Vinca]

1. It's not just illegal immigrants in California, it's U.S. citizens in the

northeast trying to put a little oil in the furnace. The returnable can machines at the entrance to the grocery store are busy 24/7. People wheel in giant bags of cans scavenged from who-knows-where and it's obvious the cans aren't from last night's party. Old people, young people, people who don't look broke . . . lots of them. Thank you, George W. Bush.

[ellisonz]

2. K & R