Michael Perelman wrote:
>
> One of the problems is that people who do not have "respectable"
> employment are made to feel shame within our system.
>
My memories of the '30s are extremely scattered and undependable (I was born in 1930), but I remember or think I remember images of the vicious attack on the WPA at that time. "Leaf rakers" and "leaning on shovels" reflect the rhetoric of the mass media at that time. I would say now that that rhetoric was double-edged -- that is, it was aimed not only at the general public but more specifically at those _doing_ WPA work, to make them hate themselves. This continues to be part of attacks on welfare, in part aimed at the recipients themselves.
Carrol