This isn’t about editing or writing.

This is Project Hamilton.

This is about current US society and economics. It may apply to others in other societies, but I am speaking to the only one I know and in which I participate.

This is me summoning the haves. If you’re doing rather well, I’ve got a suggestion for you.

Because of the disease, which it seems highly likely will soon enter its second phase and do multiple times more harm, there are two economic categories: the haves and the have-nots. The haves either have plenty of money or are still earning enough to live and save a little. Most of them are currently spending less money than they usually do, so they have some extra. The have-nots are chronically underemployed, working at risk, or deprived of all income. Few of them asked for those situations.

The reason the haves can still buy groceries and live through this in relative comfort is in large part because some of the have-nots go to work. The have-even-lesses can’t even do that. My answer is Project Hamilton.

The concept is simple. You probably don’t shop locally as often as you did before. When you do, kick in an extra $10. If buying groceries, give the extra bill to the checker, and ask her please to hang onto it until someone comes along who is obviously in serious distress, then contribute it to that person’s payment. If you are going to get takeout or drive-through from a restaurant, add $10 in tip. The drive-through people never get anything normally; the takeout people are probably waitstaff who normally rely on tips. Wherever you go, give them an extra ten bucks. If you need to, do like at the grocery store and have them share it with a person in need.

At some point the nail salons and barbers will reopen, and you can take it for gospel they are all financially blasted (and sick of driving Uber or Grubhub). First couple times you go back, tack on an extra $10 above your normal gratuity, to help them catch up and rebuild.

If you cannot afford this, I’m not asking it of you.

If you can, I am. Share. Show people that you value them. Sustain this through the recovery. Right now the economic reality is that the dollars aren’t turning over. It is in your power to turn over some more dollars, which will help people have work and make money and stay somewhat afloat. It will also give people heart, which has its own value.

We have become a dystopian society, but this initiative has nothing to do with nationalism or politics. This has to do with whether we choose to share, or not to share. This has to do with how we each define ourselves. Are we really this dystopia, or are we better than that? Talk is cheap (including blog posts). What you do is who you are.

I have made my choice. Yours is up to you.

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Addendum: in the early response to this post, shared in a number of places, I have seen many method variations on its basic theme. All of those variations are great. Better still, many people were already doing them before I got around to this post.

I salute all of you who participate in any way, whether you were already doing so or have now just begun. Any generous way one chooses to do this is a correct way.