Before the Covid-19 pandemic, many Bay Area non-tech gig workers and self-employed people (Uber and Lyft drivers, house-cleaners, gardeners, restaurant waiters, and the like) barely earned enough for vastly inflated rent and very basic expenses (car insurance, car-payments, phone service, utilities), let alone very basic food and clothing, especially if they had families.

A month now into lockdown in this state, how are these low-income people going to be able to pay June rent on time when their jobs haven't yet been able to show any signs of reappearing (if many of them ever do), let alone rent for each month following, AND "back-rent" for April and May by September 28? It will be impossible. The stimulus payments will likely come *after* the June rent is due on June 1st, and they won't suffice to pay more than about two months' rent at most.

Moving out of the Bay Area sounds like an obvious and easy solution---until one thinks of the financial demands involved in moving: first & last months of rent for the new rental, a security deposit, and the obvious need to secure a job in the new area, in order not to lose the new rental! Where will the funds come from, for those unavoidable up-front expenses? Ample savings accounts and credit cards with large spending allowances aren’t exactly what people with low and uneven earning-power often possess.

Former gig workers and self-employed people apparently WON'T be getting the weekly $600 *extra* payment that people currently unemployed from "regular" jobs (jobs with unemployment, disability, and other benefits) will get with their Pandemic Unemployment Compensation program. Instead, they will be lucky if they get as much as $300 a week *total* with the lower-tier Pandemic Unemployment *Assistance* program that they're assigned to---try paying rent almost anywhere with that, let alone life's other essentials, especially if one's a single parent!

Who would have thought that this great and glorious country would reduce its low-paid workers to a life that John Steinbeck documented 80 years ago? Covid-19 is a huge enough disaster in itself, but even more suffering is to come unless the people who have long been needy get much more financial support in these cruel times.

If one cannot pay rent, it is unfortunate but small landlords have expenses too.

I am currently trying to evict two duplex renters who are behind three months.

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