Read this originally in high school, like many other Americans, I'm sure. I didn't recall much about the book 40 years later, so I decided to read it again.

This is an amazing slice of life story from the Great Depression. It follows the Joad family from their farm in Oklahoma, where they lost the land due to the Dust Bowl and corporate farming, to California, where they struggled to find work, empathy, food, or any sense of stability or worth. The story is simple in its premise and stunning in its execution.

As a country, we failed our people in the lead up to the Great Depression, allowing for the 1% (as we say now) to move all the money to them and ignore the plight of the rest of the country. As a country, we are doing the same now. The rich pile more money into their coffers, the poor slide further into poverty, and the middle-class is losing ground while being expected to carry the tax burden.

The parallels to today are numerous and frightening. We can only survive if we band together, and then only if we can get the government to focus on supporting the workers. I don't have a lot of hope.