Whose Lima plant provided Ford
Dewey and Linda worked for Hayes-Albion, a Michigan-based company whose Lima plant provided Ford with chrome and trim. Their combined annual income was almost $50,000 a year, not a lot but enough at the time to buy a home in the middle-class suburb of Bath Township, just east of Lima. By the end of the 1980s, each of their four children had graduated from high school, and two had gone on to college. There was no reason to doubt that their family's continued upward mobility was secure.
One recent morning, I went to visit Dewey's son Scott Chaffins, who still lives in Bath, in a small three-bedroom house he shares with his wife, Lori, and their two college-age kids, Joshua, 21, and Alyssa, 18. Now 50, Scott is a burly guy who meets me dressed in long cutoffs, a blue polo shirt and flip-flops. He shuffles through his kitchen followed by the family's big brown Lab, Brutus. Stopping briefly to say hello, Scott then excuses himself to lie down. ''It's his blood pressure,'' Lori says, apologetically. A chemist and former college professor, Scott's been out of work for six months. ''Stress adds a lot of health issues, as you can imagine,'' she says.
A short, round woman wearing a pink T-shirt and shorts, Lori Chaffins sits at a long, rectangular wooden table, drinking Dr Pepper. It's a Friday afternoon, and she's off for the summer from her job driving a school bus and working in the nearby middle-school cafeteria. The schedule isn't bad, she says – working only nine months out of the year means she's had more time to spend with her kids. On the other hand, her annual income is roughly $25,000, and she hasn't had a raise in six years. Since her husband's been out of work, they've liquidated Scott's retirement and drained most of their savings, about $60,000 in total. Still, they have close to $160,000 in debt between their mortgage ($1,200 per month), car payments ($305), health insurance ($300 per month, with a $1,750 deductible per person) and the loans ($7,000) they took out to help pay for Joshua's living expenses at Bowling Green State.