The Man Who Turned Down the Sports Section!

 

This is a story I liked to tell to my Economics students. See if you can guess why.

In the 1980’s I worked for a small company that marketed credit cards for department stores, back in the day when every city had a few regional stores.  My office was in a one story building located on the corner of Sheridan and Elmwood in Kenmore, NY, a detail only important to the Buffalonians reading this. I liked to leave the office for lunch, and several had options within walking distance. One of the choices was one of the many good Greek restaurants you could find in the Buffalo area.

In the 80’s I was in a fantasy baseball league, or Rotisserie league, as they were known in those days.  This was pre-internet, of course, and in those primitive times the best daily sports information was to be found in USA Today, making it required reading for me at lunch every day. (As a side note to this, because of this habit, several times I returned to the office to inform my boss that one of our customers had filed for bankruptcy!).  Most days I happily enjoyed my lunch with the colorful national paper, and newsprint covering my hands. 

One day I walk into the Greek joint with the paper and take a seat at the counter a few seats away from an older man who smiles and says hello. He was eating alone, with no reading material,  a situation I still can’t imagine, so he was happy to chat about anything. We talked a bit about the usual stuff, then I got into the sports section. When I was done with it, I offered him the sports section, because that’s what guys do.  

“Thanks, but I can’t read” he replied. 

I tried not to let on how shocked I was. I guess I grew up in a very fortunate situation, because as far as I know that was the first person I had ever met who could not read. I didn’t think such a person existed in this country!  I could barely imagine it. I thought maybe he was kidding, but there was no indication that this was a joke.

My offer led to us talking a bit more. I have no recollection of how the conversation progressed to the point where he told me this:

“This morning I saw this guy in a wheelchair. I offered him a few bucks because I figured there was no way a guy like that could make a living.” 

Again, there was kind of a stunned silence on my part.  The man who couldn’t read thought the man in the wheelchair was handicapped? The man who couldn’t READ, thought the man in the wheelchair was handicapped! 

I pretty much let this drop at this point. But on the walk back to my office I thought about how I could easily do my job without functioning legs.  Hell, Stephen Hawking managed to succeed for years in his severely disabled state. 

At this point you might be able to figure out why I would speak of this in an Econ class. One of the things that separates rich countries from poor is called “Human Capital”, meaning the education and skill level of the people.  The correlation between literacy rates and GDP/person is as close to perfect as you can get.  So, I would ask the class, who was more disabled, my friend who couldn’t read, or the man in the wheelchair, assuming that man was literate. In fact, can you even imagine a job you could do today that didn’t require some minimal level or reading? This story was almost too perfect for teaching this, and I’m not sure my students didn’t think I made it up. I wish I was so clever. 

I wonder if my illiterate friend lived into the days of the internet and social media. If so, what a shame that his disability would have prevented him from enjoying the extreme pleasure of arguing with an idiot on social media!