When the pandemic hit San Francisco in March, Berta Lopez, 47, was earning $1,000 a week doing a mix of cleaning and child care from 8am to 6pm for a couple employed in the tech sector.
The job, paying $20 per hour, helped sustain her household, along with income from two adult sons working in the travel and hospitality industry. But their livelihoods were shattered when the crisis hit: Ms Lopez’s employers could only pay her for the first two weeks of the lockdown, while one son was moved to part-time, and the other was laid off.
Now she has no choice but to accept an offer from the family she worked for to bring her back for just 26 hours a week, hopefully in early June. “I cross my fingers and I pray a lot, because to be honest with you, I spent all my savings and all my backups,” Ms Lopez said in a phone interview. “It’s gonna be tough”.