http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/09/15/where-all-work-is-created-equal/?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=thab1
September 15, 2011, 8:30 pm
Where All Work Is Created Equal
By TINA ROSENBERG
TimeBankIn Manhattan, Zu Dong taught calligraphy to members of the
Visiting Nurse Service of New York’s Community Connections TimeBank,
which lets people exchange services.
School went badly last year for José, Angel and Estefani. The 8-year-
old twins and their 7-year-old sister are recent immigrants to the
Washington Heights neighborhood of Manhattan. In part because they
didn’t speak much English, late in 2010 all three were notified they
were in danger of failing.
But their fortunes changed in January. They began going to the Fort
Washington Library every Saturday for two hours of one-on-one tutoring
from Elayne Castillo-Vélez, her sister, Sharon Castillo, and their
grandmother, Saturnina Gutiérrez. The children had lost confidence
and didn’t feel that more hours spent with school books would produce
anything, said Castillo-Vélez. “There were times when all they wanted
to do was talk about their week,” she said.
“But once we started working one-on-one it triggered something in
them,” she said. “They were enthusiastic.” Castillo-Vélez would ask
José’s teacher what he should work on, and the teacher would write
back — work on vowel sounds, or subtraction strategies. The children
began to take books out of the library every week. Their grades
improved. When June came, they all passed, and won certificates for
academic improvement and achievement.
The two families met because of a bank — a time bank, where the unit
of currency is not a dollar, but an hour. When you join a time bank,
you indicate what services you might be able to offer others:
financial planning, computer de-bugging, handyman repairs,
housecleaning, child care, clothing alterations, cooking, taking
someone to a doctor’s appointment on the bus, visiting the homebound
or English conversation. People teach Mandarin and yoga and sushi-
making. Castillo-Vélez earns a credit for each hour she spends
tutoring José. She spends the credits on art classes.
A time bank is a way to make a small town out of a big city.
Time banks — more than 300 of them — exist in 23 countries. The
largest one in New York City is the Visiting Nurse Service of New York
Community Connections TimeBank.
It has more than 2,000 members and is most active in three places —
Upper Manhattan (Washington Heights and Inwood), Lower Manhattan
(Battery Park City, Chinatown and the Lower East Side) and parts of
Brooklyn (Sunset Park and Bay Ridge). Members come from all over
New York City, but exchanges are easiest when people live in the same
neighborhood — like Castillo-Vélez and José.
There is something old fashioned about a time bank. Home repair,
child care, visiting shut-ins and taking someone to the doctor are now
often commercial transactions; a time bank is a return to an era where
neighbors did these tasks for each other. But a time bank is also
something radical. It throws out the logic of the market — in a time
bank, all work has equal value. A 90-year-old can contribute on an
equal basis with a 30 year old. Accompanying someone to the doctor is
as valuable as Web design.
The idea comes from Edgar Cahn, a legendary anti-poverty activist.
(Cahn and his late wife, Jean Camper Cahn, established the Antioch
School of Law to train advocates for the poor, and were instrumental
in founding the federal Legal Services Corporation.) In his book “No
More Useless People,” Cahn writes that time banks were a response to
cuts in social programs during the Reagan years. Cahn wrote: “If we
can’t have more of that kind of money, why can’t we create a new kind
of money to put people and problems together?”
Time banks also owe much of their development to Ana Miyares, who in
the 1980s gave up a lucrative position in international banking to
join the time bank movement in its infancy. She has founded time banks
in various countries, and today is the manager of the Visiting Nurse
Service’s time bank. Miyares sees time banking a little differently
than Cahn does. “I would like to see social justice — but in a
different way, using social capital, energizing social capital to be
responsible citizens,” she said.
Fred R. Conrad/The New York TimesAna Miyares, the manager of Community
Connections TimeBank, said that the program restores trust among new
immigrants and helps them integrate.
The value of a time bank during a time of high unemployment is
obvious. It is a way for underemployed people to put their skills to
work to get things they need. (During the Great Depression, a group of
men living in a Hooverville of unlaid sewer pipe in California began a
barter exchange that eventually had 100,000 members.) Forty percent of
the members of the Visiting Nurse Service’s time bank, for example,
have an annual income of less than $9,800. Many time banks have a
large percentage of members who are older and living on a fixed
income. “The difference it makes to have a handyman come out and do a
repair for the cost of materials could be the difference between being
able to purchase medicine or not,” said Barbara Huston, the president
and chief executive of Partners in Care, a time bank based near
Baltimore. “Getting a ride to the doctor and saving $30 to $50 in
transport costs might mean being able to buy all their vegetables.”
But a time bank it is more than a barter Craigslist. Mashi Blech, the
director of the Visiting Nurse Service time bank, said that only 10
percent of members bother to consistently record the hours they put
in. In what industry would 90 percent of wage workers not care about
recording their hours?
Castillo-Vélez, for one, doesn’t always record hers. She knows the
Fort Washington Library well, because she used to go there as a child.
Her grandmother is an avid reader in Spanish, and Castillo-Vélez
inherited her love of books. Now a graduate of Stony Brook
University, Castillo-Vélez tutors José because she remembers her own
journey. “I know how it is to have to learn another language and
have no one really there. I also overcame my shyness — sitting in
class without speaking up. I saw myself in them,” she said.
Richard Perry/The New York TimesRegina Gradess, a member of the
Community Connections TimeBank, at her home. “Slowly, through
sharing,” she said, “friendships form.”
Several TimeBank members told me that activities gradually cease being
services performed and become instead hours with friends. When Regina
Gradess was 56, for example, she met Doris Feldman, who was 80. She
began to drive Feldman places in her car. Technically, Gradess was
providing companionship to an elderly woman. But that’s not what it
felt like. “I would take her to the duck pond, or a unique thrift
shop, or libraries,” she said. “We’d ride the bus to a museum and talk
about all the architecture we saw. Every time I was with her we had
tons of things to talk about. It was wonderful for me and wonderful
for her.” They saw each other at least every other week. When
Feldman died in July at the age of 84, Gradess said she felt like she
had lost her soul mate.
A time bank is a way to make a small town out of a big city —
something especially important for retired people, who might go for
days without human contact. The Visiting Nurse Service TimeBank has
group gatherings — birthday parties, potlucks, trips — in addition to
the work exchanges. A survey of members over 60 years old in 2009
found that 90 percent had made new friends, 71 percent saw those
friends at least once a week, and 42 percent saw their TimeBank
friends a few times a week. By overwhelming margins, the members
reported that they felt more a part of a community, and their trust of
others had increased — especially of other people who were different
from them. The vast majority of pairings in the TimeBank bring
together very different people – in ethnicity, income level, or
especially, age; in Castillo-Vélez’s family, her grandmother, mother,
aunt, sister, brother, husband and sister-in-law also are active in
the TimeBank. Many pairings also cross language barriers. Members
speak 29 different languages, and for just under half the members,
English is not one of them.
Despite its size — or perhaps because of it — New York City offers
people many different groups to join and many different ways to make
friends. What makes a time bank different is that the purpose of the
connection is ostensibly to give help — something that makes a lot of
people more comfortable and confident. “I’m a shy person and I have a
problem with receiving,” said Gradess. Even if you happen to be the
one receiving services in any particular transaction, you know you
will be giving help to someone else.
Blech tells a story from an earlier time bank experience about Betty,
a member in her 70s who suffered from several serious medical
conditions and had been the caregiver for her mother for 15 years.
When Betty’s mother died, “people were thinking now she’ll be less
stressed,” said Blech. “I was concerned that she’d be depressed —
she was losing her role in life.”
Blech called one afternoon two weeks after the mother’s death and
found Betty very depressed. “Later, I found out that she had barely
gotten out of bed in two weeks, and that the bottle of antidepressants
she was prescribed was still sitting on her table, unopened,” she said.
They talked for a while, and then Blech said, “I need you.” Betty was
a skilled crocheter. “I was going to an international conference and
needed a baby gift,” Blech said. Would Betty make a baby blanket?
“I don’t think I’m up for that,” Betty said. Blech asked her to think
about it.
Five minutes later Blech’s phone rang. “Should it have a hood?” said
Betty. “How about a matching crocheted hippo or dog?”
Blech invited her to the next time bank gathering to show off her
crocheting. She left with 10 orders.
This is a story many of us can relate to. People like to cook for
others, to make things for others, to teach what they know, to use
their skills to do a job for someone who needs it. People need to
feel valued.
On Wednesday I’ll respond to comments and explain one of the mysteries
of time banks — why does the Visiting Nurse Service run one? Why do
so many hospitals? Being with and giving to others, it turns out,
are good for your health.
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