Cities: Paying More for Being Poor

Sometimes the difference between riot and order in the slums may be not a question of billions spent on social welfare but a matter of a few cents—like 10¢ more for a dozen eggs, 20¢ more for a pound of hamburger or 2¢ more for a loaf of bread. For, cruelly enough, as hearings by a House subcommittee investigating consumer problems in New York City and St. Louis indicated last week, the poor are often charged more for groceries—and often given worse goods and services—than relatively affluent shoppers in suburbs and middle-class...