The staff were pretty kind all around, facility was clean.
The dystopian aspect was how many people I saw denied, because they had donated yesterday. You can give twice a week, but have to wait a day in between. I saw at least four or five people get turned away, and they were all pretty upset. The line was extremely long - there are tons of people desperate enough to wait in line for hours to go through the painful process of having their blood sapped out.
I also got a preloaded card as my payment, which has a ton of fees associated with it - I’ll get charged if I use it at an atm or check the balance. I know these cash cards are often also used to pay people who work at like McDonald’s - it just seems like so much of the US is designed to nickel and dime the shit out of the poor.
It’s called profit maximization.
It’s really amazing how expensive being poor is.
I pay interest on my credit card loans, I pay late fees on things like electricity and my internet. The interest and late fees and all that other shit would be enough to start saving up for home.
Gas station food and energy drinks are expensive as shit, but sometimes when you are working two jobs you just want a fucking slice of pizza and enough caffeine to make it through the next shift.
I can at least manage my apartment, and can pick up a third job once school starts up again - but being in these places where I see people who are poorer than me and lack the ability to understand how to navigate the world - who don’t have a college education/the ability to read/the ability to speak English - what kind of sick and evil world is this?
I was having just this conversation with a friend of mine the other day. There is a level of net worth that once you hit it, it becomes exponentially harder to get out of poverty than someone who isn’t poor. And absolutely no amount of money can help them because unless you can stop the churn, all that money will just go toward the black hole of fees and other expenses.
A profitable one!