Three Hungry Youth at McDonald’s: A Memphis Poverty And Economics Story
One evening near the University of Memphis, where I was attending school, I walked to a nearby McDonald’s to grab a meal. The sun was setting. I felt grateful — thanks to a recent tuition refund, I had just enough money to eat out, even at a fast-food spot with prices higher than usual.
Race plays a key role in this story because in those areas closest to the McDonald’s I went to have a meal at, it is inhabited mostly by Black people, who are living in poverty. Their faces appear in news stories and in studies documenting who are the poorest people in Memphis. This stark reality has been evident and present since the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr’s economic justice work took place in the city of Memphis in the late 1960s.
As I entered, I noticed three young Black boys standing at the counter. They were trying to order, but didn’t have enough money for meals that would fill their stomachs. I watched as the worker kindly handed them cups of ice water, which was something, but not nearly enough.
Those Black boys, young Black boys, reminded me of young Black men whom I have written about previously in a poem I wrote called “Leroy And ‘Nem.” Their situations are the same. Just like the characters I write about in the poem, they were facing economic realities that local politics and policies rarely resolve or make an effort to address.
I couldn’t ignore what I was seeing. “Are y’all hungry?” I asked. All three looked up at me and nodded.
They told me what they wanted. I paid for their food and mine. The smiles on their faces said more than words could. They did thank me, but honestly, they didn’t have to.
As I walked or rode through Memphis that summer, I could see who was not getting what they needed economically and who was benefiting from the attention the well-to-do neighborhoods were receiving regularly. The faces of the people in the well-to-do neighborhoods were not Black faces.
That moment in McDonald’s taught me a lasting lesson, not just about poverty or hunger, but about proximity. I could afford dinner that night because of a brief pocket of financial relief. They couldn’t afford a meal at all.
The walk I took through my neighborhood every day passed two housing projects, dangerous sidewalks, and shattered glass. Behind me was Orange Mound, one of Memphis’s most historic neighborhoods — its resilience and challenges teaching me as much outside the classroom as I learned inside it.
Dr. King’s spirit moves through moments like these. I believe if he had been there in that McDonald’s, he would’ve done the same thing, and equity and equality in Memphis would look a lot different. We need transformational economic justice and racial justice policies in Memphis and nationwide.
