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Stop Blaming America’s Poor for Their Poverty

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Re: Stop Blaming America’s Poor for Their Poverty

#101

Post by habnds »

boromisp wrote: post #71
hestipod wrote: post #33

I was disabled by bad surgery and lost my career. No system that ostensibly should have helped, did. Denied. Denied. Denied. YEARS of adversarial, not default helpful, meetings and challenges and interviews. I saw people worse than me refused help. I saw real time as people who knew me for years or life, who respected me and my career choice helping others, decided I was a lazy mooch who wasn't trying hard enough, wa…

A possible explanation for what you've experienced can be found in the just-world hypothesis [0], or in the belief that we live in a meritocracy. It is simply a foundational part of many people's worldview and nothing sort of experiencing similar traumas will make them reconsider. [0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Just-world_hypothesis

the just-world fallacy is a much more appropriate term.

> the cognitive bias (or assumption) that a person's actions are inherently inclined to bring morally fair and fitting consequences to that person

Re: Stop Blaming America’s Poor for Their Poverty

#102

Post by jsmith99 »

rjf72 wrote: post #79
tehjoker wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For what it's worth, the ambition on the left over here (in the US) is to eliminate means testing for programs as much as possible. Healthcare problems? Free healthcare for everyone, no forms required. No home? Everyone gets a free / low cost house. We aim to do much more than that (give control of the economy to the people), but a robust welfare state is a good start.

Imagine there was a button you could push that would give every single person everything you're mentioning - a free house, free healthcare, and all the things you're not mentioning - free education, free sustenance, free childcare, free longterm paid pa/maternal leave, guaranteed high paying jobs, etc. Who wouldn't push this button? I think every single individual, right/left/libertarian/liberal/conservative or whate…

> a free house, free healthcare, and all the things you're not mentioning - free education, free sustenance, free childcare, free longterm paid pa/maternal leave, guaranteed high paying jobs, etc

The great majority of Americans nevertheless do have houses, healthcare, education, sustenance, childcare and jobs. This suggests that the economy can provide these things and that also providing them to the small proportion currently without them is probably feasible.

Making them 'free' and involving taxes just rearranges the payments involved. It doesn't require producing much more than America already does.

The challenge is to do this without damaging incentives and the economy or creating moral hazard (free riders). That's the difficulty.

Re: Stop Blaming America’s Poor for Their Poverty

#103

Post by soVeryTired »

rjf72 wrote: post #79
tehjoker wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For what it's worth, the ambition on the left over here (in the US) is to eliminate means testing for programs as much as possible. Healthcare problems? Free healthcare for everyone, no forms required. No home? Everyone gets a free / low cost house. We aim to do much more than that (give control of the economy to the people), but a robust welfare state is a good start.

Imagine there was a button you could push that would give every single person everything you're mentioning - a free house, free healthcare, and all the things you're not mentioning - free education, free sustenance, free childcare, free longterm paid pa/maternal leave, guaranteed high paying jobs, etc. Who wouldn't push this button? I think every single individual, right/left/libertarian/liberal/conservative or whate…

> It's precisely what the GDP/capita captures. It's about $62,000. And we're already chopping 27% of that in taxes to fund our current [generally underfunded] programs, so you can drop it down to $45k.

I think you've misunderstood the nature of government spending. It's not like the government destroys that 27% when it spends it: the money is just redirected from where it might have gone (i.e. consumer spending) to other places (like the maintenance of roads and hospitals). You've forgotten about the circular flow of income.

Besides, GDP per capita as a measure of the productive capacity of a country actually misses quite a lot. Suppose I run a drug company, and I charge $10k / year for a drug that's cheap to manufacture (so there are no worries about the price of intermediate goods or the value that I add). That's 10k per annum that I'm adding to GDP.

But if a competitor offers a generic version of the same drug at ten dollars a year, putting me out of business, that $10k / year diaappears from the GDP figure.

Re: Stop Blaming America’s Poor for Their Poverty

#104

Post by adrianN »

majani wrote: post #90
username90 wrote: post #73

I think the question should not be "Why are there so many poor in USA", but "Why does it suck so much to be poor in USA". I believe that the urban layout and exorbitant healthcare costs are the main issues. If poor neighborhoods were walkable and had cheap supermarkets with fresh produce then you wouldn't need a car, and the density would mean that you have plenty of potential friends within walking distance so you w…

It sucks to be poor because it sucks to be at the bottom of social hierarchies. This is an evolutionary feature of society, not a bug.

Many countries try to decrease the difference between being at the top (or at least in the upper quartile or so) of the social hierarchy and being at the bottom, resulting in less suck for the poor.

Re: Stop Blaming America’s Poor for Their Poverty

#106

Post by orwin »

majidazimi wrote: post #76
hestipod wrote: post #33

I was disabled by bad surgery and lost my career. No system that ostensibly should have helped, did. Denied. Denied. Denied. YEARS of adversarial, not default helpful, meetings and challenges and interviews. I saw people worse than me refused help. I saw real time as people who knew me for years or life, who respected me and my career choice helping others, decided I was a lazy mooch who wasn't trying hard enough, wa…

Where does this "Europe is awesome place to live" come from? I live in Germany, I got ear wax, the doctor waiting line was more than a week, so I developed tinnitus problem in a couple of days because of the wax (I don't use any headphone, I don't work in any noisy place so they don't have any effect). Insurance didn't cover medicine cost, so I paid it in cash while I was a student. Then the doctor said, it's too lat…

More than a week for a doctor? It is possible in large city, especially if you don't want (or can't afford) to pay a premium (at least in Paris). Never had any troubles in Munich, Liege, Lille or Rennes though.

The premiums are not really fair for the people living in those cities, but with the square meter price, it is understandable that cost increase for medecine too.

But if you think you have an emergency (and no money), you can still get to a hospital (at least in France). University hospitals are great too (if you have one nearby), because if your affliction is weird, you'll get some of the best doctors available to help you. Clermont-Ferrand dental surgery speciality saved two of my teeth when i was 16 and my mother on minimal income for the grand total of 0€. Any private dentist would not have bothered and have removed those two and replaced then with false ones (the teeth were stuck into the jaw bones if you want details), for probably much more.

Re: Stop Blaming America’s Poor for Their Poverty

#107

Post by ijidak »

hestipod wrote: post #33

I was disabled by bad surgery and lost my career. No system that ostensibly should have helped, did. Denied. Denied. Denied. YEARS of adversarial, not default helpful, meetings and challenges and interviews. I saw people worse than me refused help. I saw real time as people who knew me for years or life, who respected me and my career choice helping others, decided I was a lazy mooch who wasn't trying hard enough, wa…

I'm sorry to hear that happened to you.

Sadly, this ancient proverb is all too true.

"All the brothers of a poor man hate him; How much more he is shunned by his friends! He pursues them with requests, but no one responds."

Perhaps this article will help lift your spirits. http://bit.ly/2K6cVi5

Re: Stop Blaming America’s Poor for Their Poverty

#109

Post by DanBC »

majidazimi wrote: post #76
hestipod wrote: post #33

I was disabled by bad surgery and lost my career. No system that ostensibly should have helped, did. Denied. Denied. Denied. YEARS of adversarial, not default helpful, meetings and challenges and interviews. I saw people worse than me refused help. I saw real time as people who knew me for years or life, who respected me and my career choice helping others, decided I was a lazy mooch who wasn't trying hard enough, wa…

Where does this "Europe is awesome place to live" come from? I live in Germany, I got ear wax, the doctor waiting line was more than a week, so I developed tinnitus problem in a couple of days because of the wax (I don't use any headphone, I don't work in any noisy place so they don't have any effect). Insurance didn't cover medicine cost, so I paid it in cash while I was a student. Then the doctor said, it's too lat…

If you were poor in the US you'd have had the same result, but with a doctor's bill on top.

Re: Stop Blaming America’s Poor for Their Poverty

#110

Post by peteretep »

hestipod wrote: post #33

I was disabled by bad surgery and lost my career. No system that ostensibly should have helped, did. Denied. Denied. Denied. YEARS of adversarial, not default helpful, meetings and challenges and interviews. I saw people worse than me refused help. I saw real time as people who knew me for years or life, who respected me and my career choice helping others, decided I was a lazy mooch who wasn't trying hard enough, wa…

> America has a real empathy problem

Hypothesis: that’s a function of some kind of Dunbar’s Law thing about the population size of a country. China and India as confirming examples, Japan as possibly an exception

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