2014年经济学人 美国南方的家务 帮佣不再是仆人

Domestic work in the South

The Help, updated

Maids are no longer servants

UNDER segregation¹, black women were so rigidly² excluded from good jobs that 60% of those who were employed in 1940 worked as maids. With so few other choices, their wages were lousy and their white bosses could treat them abysmally³. In Kathryn Stockett's novel “The Help”, set in the early 1960s, a black maid is fired for using an indoor toilet rather than braving a tornado⁴ to use the outhouse; her revenge, involving a chocolate pie, is not for the squeamish.

Times have changed. In 1935, six out of ten urban white families above the poverty line in the South had a full-time⁵ domestic servant, compared with under 20% in the North. Now hardly anyone does. People who want help with the housework typically hire cleaners for a few hours a week, not as live-in flunkeys with whom they pretend to have a warm relationship. A cleaner arrives, blitzes the house with a Hoover and various chemicals and drives to the next job. Employers are less likely to be paternalistic and more likely to be absent, since women now hold half the jobs in America.

Thanks to labour-saving devices, maids are much more productive than in the old days. This is one reason why they earn far more, though they are still close to the bottom of the income scale. A typical Southern maid makes about 9.11 an hour, which is less than those in richer parts of the country. The metro⁶ area where the highest proportion of workers are maids is Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, a popular resort.

The demography⁷ of domestic service has changed, too. Mamie Garrett, whose family has run mortuaries in Greenville, South Carolina since 1952, remembers when other black women had few options besides becoming “a domestic”, but has herself employed help at home for decades. Some 44% of cleaners in America are Hispanic. Dalsi Lopez, a Guatemalan who tidies posh apartments in Atlanta, says many Latinas become cleaners because poor English bars them from other jobs. Nationwide, 27% of maids are illegal immigrants, estimates the Pew Research Centre, a think-tank.

According to the American Cleaning Institute, an industry group, just 12% of Americans had a regular cleaner in 2008. Some budget-conscious families use websites such as Yelp⁹ and Angie's List to hire temporary help only when they need it. Those with a little more money may opt⁸ for a concierge¹⁰ service such as Girl Friday of Alabama. Girl Friday's clients, 85% of whom are white, pay the agency to pamper¹¹ them. For 17-30 an hour, it will send someone to cook a delicious dinner for visiting in-laws, buy a present for Uncle Hank or book the family holiday. Its founder¹², Jasmine Allen, has six employees who do most of the dirty work and a smart new office in a tech hub in Birmingham.

Shelly Haines, a former teacher and pet baby-sitter in Miami, runs a firm called “Savvy Shelly” that caters¹³ to especially demanding customers. One called her late on a Sunday to ask her to send eggnog from a particular farm shop to Houston by overnight mail as a gift for a visiting brother. Another has her ensuring everything on board his boat is shipshape. Sometimes customers even want her to act “as some kind of therapist”, she sighs. The help can't answer every cry for help.

1 segregation   

n.隔离，种族隔离

参考例句：

• Many school boards found segregation a hot potato in the early 1960s.在60年代初，许多学校部门都觉得按水平分班是一个棘手的问题。
• They were tired to death of segregation and of being kicked around.他们十分厌恶种族隔离和总是被人踢来踢去。

2 rigidly   

adv.刻板地，僵化地

参考例句：

• Life today is rigidly compartmentalized into work and leisure. 当今的生活被严格划分为工作和休闲两部分。
• The curriculum is rigidly prescribed from an early age. 自儿童时起即已开始有严格的课程设置。

3 abysmally   

adv.极糟地；可怕地；完全地；极端地

参考例句：

• But the two-and-a-half-year-olds, much to my and their parents' surprise, failed abysmally. 但是两岁半的孩子根本不会找，我们与孩子的父母都很意外。 来自互联网
• Research and development spending by existing firms is abysmally low. 该数据能衡量新增的商业业务量和对创业的态度。 来自互联网

4 tornado   

n.飓风，龙卷风

参考例句：

• A tornado whirled into the town last week.龙卷风上周袭击了这座城市。
• The approaching tornado struck awe in our hearts.正在逼近的龙卷风使我们惊恐万分。

5 full-time   

adj.满工作日的或工作周的，全时间的

参考例句：

• A full-time job may be too much for her.全天工作她恐怕吃不消。
• I don't know how she copes with looking after her family and doing a full-time job.既要照顾家庭又要全天工作，我不知道她是如何对付的。

6 metro   

n.地铁；adj.大都市的；(METRO)麦德隆(财富500强公司之一总部所在地德国，主要经营零售)

参考例句：

• Can you reach the park by metro?你可以乘地铁到达那个公园吗？
• The metro flood gate system is a disaster prevention equipment.地铁防淹门系统是一种防灾设备。

7 demography   

n.人口统计，人口学

参考例句：

• Demography is the analysis of population variables.人口学是对人口变量的分析。
• It was once a rule of demography that people have fewer children as their countries get richer.按人口统计学的一贯规律，一个国家里的人民越富有，他们所拥有的孩子就越少。

8 opt   

vi.选择，决定做某事

参考例句：

• They opt for more holiday instead of more pay.他们选择了延长假期而不是增加工资。
• Will individual schools be given the right to opt out of the local school authority?各个学校可能有权选择退出地方教育局吗？

9 yelp   

vi.狗吠

参考例句：

• The dog gave a yelp of pain.狗疼得叫了一声。
• The puppy a yelp when John stepped on her tail.当约翰踩到小狗的尾巴，小狗发出尖叫。

10 concierge   

n.管理员；门房

参考例句：

• This time the concierge was surprised to the point of bewilderment.这时候看门人惊奇到了困惑不解的地步。
• As I went into the dining-room the concierge brought me a police bulletin to fill out.我走进餐厅的时候，看门人拿来一张警察局发的表格要我填。

11 pamper   

v.纵容，过分关怀

参考例句：

• Don't pamper your little daughter.别把你的小女儿娇坏了！
• You need to pamper yourself and let your charm come through.你需要对自己放纵一些来表现你的魅力。

12 Founder   

n.创始者，缔造者

参考例句：

• He was extolled as the founder of their Florentine school.他被称颂为佛罗伦萨画派的鼻祖。
• According to the old tradition,Romulus was the founder of Rome.按照古老的传说，罗穆卢斯是古罗马的建国者。

13 caters   

提供饮食及服务( cater的第三人称单数 )； 满足需要，适合

参考例句：

• That shop caters exclusively to the weaker sex. 那家商店专供妇女需要的商品。
• The boutique caters for a rather select clientele. 这家精品店为特定的顾客群服务。