In these times of The Great Recession I was really touched to read this story.

The question posed to the panel this week really struck a nerve, especially after my recent conversation with George Jones, executive director of Bread for the City, one of Washington, D.C.’s most respected nonprofit community organizations. Under George’s leadership, Bread’s managerial team recently agreed to a 12% pay cut, and the staff to a 10% reduction, so as not to eliminate their programs that serve D.C.’s poor. This was not a unilateral decision made by the executive director and board. Staff members had an opportunity to weigh in on the difficult choices before them: cut programs, lay-off some colleagues, or take pay cuts across the organization.

This is simply amazing. Yet I have to ask the question. Why are vital NGO’s making sacrifices? Why are the working poor and the middle class making sacrifices? Why are they making all the sacrifices when there are institutions receiving money from these same people, in the form of bailouts, doing wrong by us all? Why did we have to make such an uproar to get some AIG execs to return their bonus money? If no one had said anything would they have still returned it? Why are Congressional Republicans getting so upset about Wagoner but they could care less about what really matters?