Democratic Rep. Katie Porter stumps JPMorgan's Jamie Dimon on working-class budget math

Rep. Katie Porter grills JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon
(Image credit: Screenshot/YouTube/The Guardian)

At a House Financial Services Committee hearing Wednesday, freshman Rep. Katie Porter (D-Calif.) grilled JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon on how a JPMorgan employee named Patricia who earns $16.50 an hour — or $35,070 a year — should manage her family's budget. On Thursday, Porter told CNN that the job and the numbers were real but "Patricia" was a composite of a lot of her constituents. "There are thousands and thousands, and tens of thousands of Patricias out there," Porter said.

This Patricia has one 6-year-old daughter, with whom she shares a one-bedroom apartment in Irvine, California. After accounting for bare-bones living expenses, Porter calculated, Patricia was $567 in the hole at the end of each month.

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE
https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/flexiimages/jacafc5zvs1692883516.jpg

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up
Explore More
Peter Weber, The Week US

Peter has worked as a news and culture writer and editor at The Week since the site's launch in 2008. He covers politics, world affairs, religion and cultural currents. His journalism career began as a copy editor at a financial newswire and has included editorial positions at The New York Times Magazine, Facts on File, and Oregon State University.