Media Nation

Boston Globe columnist Maggie Jackson yesterday gave us a feel-good story about families who are enjoying all kinds of togetherness now that they’ve had to downsize their careers and get by on less money than it costs to drive through the tollbooths on the Tobin Bridge every day. Jackson’s lead example: the Ayanna family of Somerville, mom, dad and two kids making it on $35,000 a year.

Well, now we know that they’re not making it, and that all is not the bliss that Jackson describes. We can thank Amiri Ayanna, who has been open enough about her family’s situation to leave a series of comments here about life since her husband, Ariel, was laid off from his $170,000-a-year job as a corporate lawyer. To wit:

• The Ayannas pay $1,850 a month for the mortgage on their Somerville condo. But they are trying to negotiate that down, and may soon be forced to move into a studio apartment — with a 5-year-old boy and a baby.
• Jackson wrote that Ariel Ayanna is “considering becoming a stay-at-home dad for a year.” Not true, says Amiri: “I wanted to clear up one other inaccuracy stated in the Boston Globe article: Ariel is enjoying his family time now, out of necessity, but is very actively and strenuously looking for work, since, as I stated, our financial situation is fairly tenuous.”
• Amiri also has this to say: “I agree our finances were painted way too rosily by this article (many things were selectively excluded from the lengthy interviews with both myself and my spouse, and our family was used as a story ‘hook’ because we were willing to disclose specific dollar numbers, I think).”

What seems clear is that the Ayannas are doing a lot better on $35,000 than most of us would — but that it’s not their choice, and that Jackson massaged their situation to fit a pre-existing template. The result: a story that is accurate, for the most part, but that is fundamentally not true.

If Jackson and/or the Globe would like to respond, I will, of course, post it immediately.

There has got to be something missing [or maybe not? see below] from Maggie Jackson’s account of the Ayanna family in today’s Boston Globe. She reports that the Ariel and Amiri Ayanna and their two young kids are living in Somerville “on $35,000 a year in unemployment and savings” now that Ariel has lost his job as a $170,000-a-year corporate lawyer.

Jackson writes:

[T]he job loss had some unintended perks: The family was able to save money — and spend more time together — on a two-week camping trip to attend a cousin’s Texas wedding. And Ariel, who is considering becoming a stay-at-home dad for a year, is around more often to cook, practice violin with their 5-year-old son, and play with their 9-month-old son.

“It’s hard to slow down. It’s hard to step back,” says Amiri Ayanna, who plans to begin a master’s degree program at Harvard Divinity School this summer. But “it’s a blessing in disguise.”

Well, fine. But don’t you think there’s something awfully suspicious about that $35,000-a-year figure? We’re not told if the Ayannas rent or own. But Somerville is a high-cost community. If they were somehow able to get away with paying just $1,500 a month in rent or mortgage payments, then they’ve only got $17,000 left for everything else — heat, electricity, food and (unless he’s teaching himself) violin lessons for the 5-year-old. Their trip to Texas — which they write about on their blog — may have been cheap, but it surely wasn’t free.

Either there’s a large pile of money lurking in the background or the Ayannas are truly miracle-workers. But Jackson leaves us in the dark. Given how many people are struggling these days, it’s pretty cavalier to suggest, on the basis of no evidence, that we could all live like the Ayannas if we were only willing to eat at home more often.

Update: Amiri Ayanna checks in, and says it’s all legit. Hard to see how they make the numbers work, but there you go.