With all due respect JPX - You say 'Countless' and yet you continue to speak in generalities. I can't make the claim I'm a very descriptive person of course but if you are going to use this language then please just provide one example of how a person can't take one day a year to get an ID. It's not as if this process would take the whole day either so they can take a day to take care of other important matters while including a trip to the DMV on their 'things to do' list.
Alright. Say you work for $10 an hour—not actually the lowest possible wage, in this country—which equates to about $1600 a month, given a full-time, forty-hour-per-week job; then let's say (generously, since we don't know which state this hypothetical occurs in, et cetera) that, after taxes, that leaves about $1440 monthly. Folks tend to be forced to spend about 50% of their income on room&board, rent&utilities—whatever you want to call it—which leaves about $720 leftover for the remainder of the month. Say you're a single father or mother, which a couple children—things start to get pretty tight, even if you're working every available hour of your allotted forty. Most employment at that level—which covers a vast swatch of citizens of this country—doesn't come with any paid leave, or even the guarantee of leave when you want/need it. Even a half day off—$40, pre-tax—represents about a 2.5% loss of monthly earnings, or 5% reduction on what's left over after rent&utilities; a full day off represents twice that. Then say circumstances are less than perfect: last pay-period, you had to take two days off for yours or your children's illness—losing 20% of non-rent income—plus another half-day (generously) to obtain/renew government identification (another 5%). Now you're short from the previous pay-period, and wondering if you can afford to request another half-day off (again: generously, considering some of the lines for voting—particularly in states that restrict or do not have early/mail-in voting) just for the luxury of voting.
And all that's assuming your employer either can/will give you those partial or full shifts off. In many cases—especially service- and retail-type employment—that's a non-option.
I'm quite lucky, by many standards; you are too, I can assume, by virtue of your position on this issue. It's hard to appreciate what a luxury mere time can be, especially to take care of things that might legitimately be
both "important matters"
and luxuries in the face of even-more-important matters.
