Sarah Rivas was barely making rent since she’d moved to the city of Sunnyvale, in Silicon Valley, California. When, three months into the pandemic, she woke up to an email from her school announcing a nearly 7% cut in teachers’ pay, she gave up a three-year battle. “I moved into my parent’s house,” said Rivas, who’s been teaching her class of twelfth graders from Sacramento, three hours from their high school. “Not what every 26-year-old wants to do.” Rivas makes above the median household inc...

Tracy Tran’s years of savings are gone. Most went into the nearly $13,500 monthly rent she says she’s been paying for her shuttered business since March, when coronavirus public health orders forced her to close. La Orquidea Salon and Spa has been sitting empty ever since on busy North Santa Cruz Ave, Los Gatos. So have most of the state’s roughly 11,000 other nail salons. “It’s hard to tell how long we can keep up, maybe one month,” said Tran, a first-generation Vietnamese immigrant who lives ...