>"For instance, in Seattle's King County, the annual household survival budget for a family of four (including one infant and one preschooler) in 2016 was nearly $85,000." An $85,000 "budget" is needed for a 4-person household's "survival" in King County? Otherwise they're dying? Maybe United Way's underlying data explains this better, but CNN's conclusions don't seem well explained or supported. Edit: What's weird i…
Almost half of US families can't afford basics like rent and food
51–60 of 112 posts
Re: Almost half of US families can't afford basics like rent and food
#52Earlier quoted context omitted.
I would argue that there are worse things than the sweet release of death. Living without dignity might be one of them. That being said, I'm not sure how I feel about having "cell phone" in that list of things that are considered necessities.
Cellphones are cheap computers these days. It's very hard to participate in today's economy, much less its education system, without internet access.
Re: Almost half of US families can't afford basics like rent and food
#53Earlier quoted context omitted.
I would argue that there are worse things than the sweet release of death. Living without dignity might be one of them. That being said, I'm not sure how I feel about having "cell phone" in that list of things that are considered necessities.
Land line phones are more expensive, and require a stable address; public phones are scarce and getting scarcer. Mobile phones are a necessity.
As far as cost, looks like land line service is 15-30$ a month with things like caller ID, call waiting and voicemail. That's generally much cheaper than any mobile phone with a data plan and doesn't require a phone that costs hundreds of dollars. Even MVNO solutions like Mint start at 45$ every three months before tax and sim shipping.
You also don't need payphones to be abundant, From 1990 to 1999 (ages 5-14) I used a payphone maybe a dozen times and nearly all of those were to have discussions with friends that I didn't want my parents to hear so I rode my bike 2 blocks to Little Caesars and used the phone in their parking lot. And I don't think a single time after that yet I didn't have a cellphone until 2004. I still rarely talk on the phone, I will go months without using a single minute.
I will listen to voicemails a few times a week but I will either go see the person or if it is a business I need to call back I'll do so at my convenience, not when they want to talk to me.
Re: Almost half of US families can't afford basics like rent and food
#54>"For instance, in Seattle's King County, the annual household survival budget for a family of four (including one infant and one preschooler) in 2016 was nearly $85,000." An $85,000 "budget" is needed for a 4-person household's "survival" in King County? Otherwise they're dying? Maybe United Way's underlying data explains this better, but CNN's conclusions don't seem well explained or supported. Edit: What's weird i…
I'm not sure whether you are arguing in good faith or not, so I'd say just bypass all the 'survival' stuff you are stuck on and essentially replace it with 'middle class'. Now you may also be pedantic and say that middle-class is supposed to be the middle , so 50% is about right. But what you can't argue with is that nearly half of Americans simply cannot build any wealth or get out of any debt and likely can't meet…
If one takes the median household income in the United States $75,938[0] in 2017, you're asserting that it is literally impossible ("simply cannot") to design a budget to build wealth, get out of debt, and those other items you mention? Some families are certainly in a dire circumstance, but I disagree that the median family can't build wealth and meet those other items if they budget responsibly.
Re: Almost half of US families can't afford basics like rent and food
#55In many of these cases it seems like having kids may have been an ill-advised life choice. Having kids is always a choice not a right.
The ability to have kids or not is one thing, the right to make the choice is another, and it's constantly being attacked by religious extremists.
Re: Almost half of US families can't afford basics like rent and food
#56>"For instance, in Seattle's King County, the annual household survival budget for a family of four (including one infant and one preschooler) in 2016 was nearly $85,000." An $85,000 "budget" is needed for a 4-person household's "survival" in King County? Otherwise they're dying? Maybe United Way's underlying data explains this better, but CNN's conclusions don't seem well explained or supported. Edit: What's weird i…
How's that different then a standard definition of survive? Everything listed there is needed to survive.
Re: Almost half of US families can't afford basics like rent and food
#57Earlier quoted context omitted.
so only the rich should reproduce? absolutely disgusting mindset. nobody chooses a life of poverty, and the overwhelming inequality of our current society both perpetuates and exacerbates it.
If you can't care for your child, you shouldn't have one. The natural order is that children from unfit parents die. There are too many humans on this planet as it is. If you're impoverished in your thirties, it is probably the result of a long history of poor life choices. You can get dealt a horrible hand with lots of tragedy and disadvantages and still be able to make it on your own in your thirties, as long as yo…
So... wow, thats one hell of a logic leap. Ignoring how close this is to progressive attitudes in the early 20th century, what about "happy accidents". This is a rather to be blunt disgusting attitude to our fellow humans.
> If you're impoverished in your thirties, it is probably the result of a long history of poor life choices. You can get dealt a horrible hand with lots of tragedy and disadvantages and still be able to make it on your own in your thirties, as long as you're moderately intelligent and hardworking.
I get the distinct impression you have no clue what you're talking about and have never worked paycheck to paycheck in your life. One bill can cascade into exactly what your saying is "a long history of poor life choices".
The attitudes such as this are exactly why populist messages are winning a lot of disaffected people. If you're telling them: improve or die, or just die if you're not useful to companies, is it any wonder they're rejecting the worldview wholesale?
I hate politics but the attitudes espoused in the parent post do nothing but blame people for the lives they tend to have been born with irrespective of ability or life choices. As someone that barely escaped things only by dumb luck at picking computer nonsense as a profession, the lack of empathy and understanding by people that have never seen what life is like in survival mode is both astounding and saddening.
Re: Almost half of US families can't afford basics like rent and food
#58If "Nearly 51 million households don't earn enough to afford a monthly budget that includes housing, food, child care, health care, transportation and a cell phone" Is true does that mean those households do without those things? Or are they subsidized via other methods? Medicare/medicaid for health insurance for example. Such programs often have income maximums that households may be attempting to optimise for. We o…
https://www.dropbox.com/s/ne0s04q4wfhuih6/19UW_ALICE_Project...
The standards they use are not lavish (renting an efficiency apartment for a single person or 2BR for family of 3 or more, home daycares, "thrifty" meals), but there are some statistical quirks that make this headline a little misleading. They set the housing budget at "the 40th percentile rent", health care at "average health care expenses", and transportation at "average transportation expenses". This is like saying 40% of households are below the 40th percentile, which is kinda duh.
In practice, families that don't make a lot of money (or that do make a lot of money but want to save up a shit-ton and retire) make do with a bunch of cheap alternative living arrangements. Instead of paying full rent, multiple families double-up or triple-up in a housing unit. Multiple generations live together. Grandma takes care of the kids instead of paying for childcare. They shop in budget produce markets. They just don't go to the doctor and hope it's not serious. They walk to work, and the kids take the bus to school.
Re: Almost half of US families can't afford basics like rent and food
#59Earlier quoted context omitted.
Land line phones are more expensive, and require a stable address; public phones are scarce and getting scarcer. Mobile phones are a necessity.
You don't need a phone 24/7/265. As far as cost, looks like land line service is 15-30$ a month with things like caller ID, call waiting and voicemail. That's generally much cheaper than any mobile phone with a data plan and doesn't require a phone that costs hundreds of dollars. Even MVNO solutions like Mint start at 45$ every three months before tax and sim shipping. You also don't need payphones to be abundant, Fr…
> You also don't need payphones to be abundant, From 1990 to 1999 (ages 5-14) I used a payphone maybe a dozen times and nearly all of those were to have discussions with friends that I didn't want my parents to hear so I rode my bike 2 blocks to Little Caesars
Ah yes. The needs of a child/teen are surely the needs of a grown person who will need to communicate with potential employers, banks, landlords, schools etc. which are all becoming almost exclusively online.
Re: Almost half of US families can't afford basics like rent and food
#60Earlier quoted context omitted.
If you can't care for your child, you shouldn't have one. The natural order is that children from unfit parents die. There are too many humans on this planet as it is. If you're impoverished in your thirties, it is probably the result of a long history of poor life choices. You can get dealt a horrible hand with lots of tragedy and disadvantages and still be able to make it on your own in your thirties, as long as yo…
Define "care" I assure you kids can and do grow up just fine without an upper middle class amount of resources thrown at them. I agree with your second paragraph though.
If you can't put a roof over their head, and feed them, you probably shouldn't have had them.
Multiple people I went to high school with have children they outright can not afford, they couldn't afford the first, or the second, one has 5 children and has been receiving government assistance (and regular handouts as food distribution from her Church) since the first was born. This sort of thing is not uncommon, people with 1 or more children that they have never been able to afford on their own.
Look, I like sex but the primary function of sex is reproduction, if you can't afford the gamble that even 1 in 100,000 times you have sex a child will result then you simply shouldn't be having sex and if you have one unplanned child, and can't afford it, you absolutely should not be doing anything that could create more until a time that have improved your means and can afford to have more.
That's not eugenics, that's not mean, that's not classism, that's not racism, that's common sense.
When couples want to adopt, they are almost always (if not always) required to meet with someone that they have to provide financial statements/pay stubs/w2s etc to as to show that they are able to adequately provide for a child, no one has a problem with this...
Edit: and for those downvoting this, that appear to think I "am the rich" I make 34k USD per year, my father died 12 days before my 13th birthday and my mother did her best to provide for us after that, I personally have a bankruptcy from trying to live foolishly above my means in my early 20's. I drive a used car. I eat black beans and rice 5 days a week for more than half of my kcal requirements so that I CAN afford luxuries like internet, a current gen phone with a data plan, a playstation plus subscription and my two gym memberships as a strength athlete. I do not have children, if I had a sexual partner I would exercise all caution as to not have children as I know it would be a financial burden that would tax my income. I am not elitist, I am not rich, I am lower middle class. I AM responsible, I DO exercise common sense, I DO put thought into my actions that may impact me financially.
Not all people living in poverty are responsible for being there, in fact most probably aren't, however many do directly worsen their situation considerably by taking up vices like alcohol & tobacco and by making financially reckless decisions like having children. These actions make it far harder to dig themselves out of poverty and they should be expected to take responsibility for their own actions instead of expecting those with more means to swoop in and rescue them from their poor choices.
The grocery figure in the original article is insane, simply switching to beans and rice for half of their kcals (which will also meet healthy fiber and protein levels) would shave hundreds off that. Adding potatoes, canned vegetables, no-frills whole grain bread, would also bring down costs and probably markedly improve overall nutrition. Instead, a good chunk of these families, are likely buying overly processed box foods/soda/junk food/fast food for way too large of a portion of their dietary intake. Again, this is a poor choice many of those families are making. I've yet to find a grocery store that doesn't have shelves laden with beans, rice, lentils, potatoes and bread.