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What Really Keeps Poor People Poor

jonbischke.com

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Re: What Really Keeps Poor People Poor

#111

Post by pessimizer »

MartinCron wrote: post #105
pessimizer wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agree completely. Also, college and internships are the best places to create social relationships with people with money. Remember that even though you may be intimidated by all of the fanciness and money around you in those environments, this is a period of time that rich people are actually slumming (assuming you're not at an expensive private/ivy league college) and will likely come into contact with more people…

That's a more cynical take on it than I was intending. I was thinking of one's college internship as an opportunity to get practical experience and prove yourself as a competent person instead of just a place to add rich folks to your network.

I totally understood your intention and agree. I didn't mean to recharacterize your comment as saying that college and internships were just a place to meet people with money; I meant to add that they were also maybe the best place to meet people with money.

Re: What Really Keeps Poor People Poor

#112

Post by run4yourlives »

solson wrote: post #35

Having been poor (not 3rd world poor, poor by American standards) I found the most difficult thing is leaving the poverty stricken network. You don't feel like you've made it until you reject the entire mindset. Until then, you feel like you've sold out. My mother still makes me feel guilty and shames me every time I see her. Until you've had a parent who shames you for doing better than they did, you'll never unders…

This. I understand exactly what you are saying, but since it doesn't jive with many people's world view, there will be stiff objection.

The only cure for poverty (in western countries), ultimately, is the person that is poor. While there are many ways and unfortunate circumstances that one can find themselves poor - and as a society I believe it is incumbent on us to provide the assistance to lessen the occurrence and/or effects of such events - the ultimate recovery is in the hands of the individual.

They are actually hindered in this by the collective network of the permanently poor - supported by political movements on the far left that stem from this same collective belief system.

Programs should be tailored to address poverty in two ways: 1. Preventing new members of the network, by mitigating the circumstances that create poverty, and, however unpopular; 2. Disrupting the network itself, by purposely setting things up in a way that the person in poverty is isolated from other poor people and surrounded with a network that encourages them to adjust their thinking.

I'm not holding my breath, but I'd love to see some experiments along this line.

Re: What Really Keeps Poor People Poor

#113

Post by dkarl »

“We claim to be part of the American dream and of a system based on merit and opportunity and talent,” Mr. Marx says. “Yet if at the top places, two-thirds of the students come from the top quartile and only 5 percent come from the bottom quartile, then we are actually part of the problem of the growing economic divide rather than part of the solution.”

Mr. Marx's job is educating, hopefully as well as possible, people who already have a great educational advantage. Anyone working at Amherst or any other elite college who thinks they can be part of the solution by directly educating underprivileged kids is indulging in fantasy. Access to higher education is not the problem; preparation is. A poor person who is prepared to succeed at an elite college has already risen beyond "underprivileged" and is on a trajectory to the upper middle class.

More precisely, if Mr. Marx is wrong to imply that there is some kind of "merit" and "talent" that makes one capable of handling higher education but is not affected by a child's opportunities and environmental influences. Amherst does not admit people based on their genetic potential or even their winning personality. They try to take social disadvantage into account when judging applicants' academic preparation, but in the end they limit admissions to students who can succeed at Amherst. If Mr. Marx wants to directly help people who are disadvantaged then he should quit Amherst and join some organization that works with people who are not and could not be Amherst students.

Re: What Really Keeps Poor People Poor

#114

Post by krschultz »

j123 wrote: post #50
krschultz wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The ridiculous part was picking one word out of a very thoughtful post (and one written as a first person account, not conjecture) and attacking that rather than the overall point. The first time I read his story I didn't even notice that he had mentioned racism in it, it was largely immaterial. But quoting only that part makes it sound like he is blaming racism as the cause for poverty, which he clearly isn't. If I…

It's as ridiculous as if he had casually tossed "overeating" into that list as well. Of course when something sticks out like a sore thumb, that individual part will get attention. Your point is that you can only reply holistically or something?

You can reply any way you want, but it makes a whole lot more sense to respond to the main point of the parent comment.

If the word racism had not been in that post, would you have commented on it at all? Would you have still felt the need to make a throw-away account for the comment?

Re: What Really Keeps Poor People Poor

#115

Post by philwelch »

pessimizer wrote: post #96
j123 wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This I think is the wisest comment I've read here. We live in an age where many people earnestly believe they can reengineer society. They identify aspects of human nature which they don't like and think it's open to reeducation. There is such a thing as human nature. Tabula rasa is a myth.

Society has been re-engineered any number of times, to good and bad effect. If you think that how it is where you are right now is how it is, has been, and always will be everywhere, you're wrong. Society is made of people, including visionaries and others who are captivated by their visions and have the ability to implement them. Contemplating human society is not the same as contemplating the stars.

Society isn't engineered, it evolves. If you try to engineer society it'll never come out quite the same way you intended; there are always unintended consequences because people are so messy and complicated.

Primary example: society is continually engineered to eliminate poverty, and yet poverty persists.

Re: What Really Keeps Poor People Poor

#116

Post by run4yourlives »

afterburner wrote: post #54
solson wrote: post #35

Having been poor (not 3rd world poor, poor by American standards) I found the most difficult thing is leaving the poverty stricken network. You don't feel like you've made it until you reject the entire mindset. Until then, you feel like you've sold out. My mother still makes me feel guilty and shames me every time I see her. Until you've had a parent who shames you for doing better than they did, you'll never unders…

People develop those bad attitudes, viewpoints, or whatever, in large part because they are poor. The contagion aspect, if it exists, is secondary. You are simply advocating the preservation of the elite by gating access to it. Of course if everyone had access to the same networks there would be no elite anymore. If it raises the prospects of the vast majority of Americans by, say, 5%, that would actually be great fo…

advocating the preservation of the elite by gating access to it

This statement assumes that there is a fixed amount of wealth that must be protected; it's prevalent in socialist thinking, as well as in the thinking of the poor (it's part of the contagion).

It's also 100% incorrect. The creation of wealth is not a zero-sum game.

Re: What Really Keeps Poor People Poor

#117

Post by ipardo »

bane wrote: post #64

Having been poor (U.S. standard) during much of my elementary and middle school years, and then escaped to a relative level of upper middle class comfort...there is one defining characteristic between my peers from back then who made it out of that situation, and those who are still there decades later: a broken decision making process best and the inability to plan exemplified in the famous Marshmallow test. http://…

Exactly. Poverty is inescapable without discipline. Unfortunately, when you have to work long hours at a low-paying day job and then go home to do your chores, the temptation of relaxation becomes unimaginably sweet unless you've already built a solid foundation of discipline in your youth.

Re: What Really Keeps Poor People Poor

#118

Post by afterburner »

forkandwait wrote: post #72
afterburner wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People develop those bad attitudes, viewpoints, or whatever, in large part because they are poor. The contagion aspect, if it exists, is secondary. You are simply advocating the preservation of the elite by gating access to it. Of course if everyone had access to the same networks there would be no elite anymore. If it raises the prospects of the vast majority of Americans by, say, 5%, that would actually be great fo…

"People develop those bad attitudes, viewpoints, or whatever, in large part because they are poor. The contagion aspect, if it exists, is secondary." I think this is the official leftist dogma, but I actually fail to see any obvious causality. I think it assumes that structural lack of opportunity (ie you qualified to be a surgeon, but the y only job you can get is shoeshine boy because you are black) leads to resent…

Official leftist dogma? Man, OK, I'll have to think about that. I'm not advocating a mindless "fight the rich" ideology, I'm not sure why you're getting that from my comment. The bit about preserving the elite wasn't meant in a way to suggest we need to eliminate the rich. I was primarily responding to this part in the parent comment: "Sending them to Harvard isn't going to make a damn bit of difference. Well, MAYBE if you sent one or two, but if you sent enough, they'd just ruin Harvard."

That and him being so hard on the attitudes of the poor, and all the talk of it holding him back. I'm not saying the poor can't also develop good habits (many learn to work really hard for little reward), but they clearly don't develop whatever attitude it is the parent commenter was looking for in order to not be held back. And that is probably largely related to not being around that particular mindset in the first place, because it's more of a mindset of the non-poor.

Re: What Really Keeps Poor People Poor

#119

Post by afterburner »

run4yourlives wrote: post #116
afterburner wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People develop those bad attitudes, viewpoints, or whatever, in large part because they are poor. The contagion aspect, if it exists, is secondary. You are simply advocating the preservation of the elite by gating access to it. Of course if everyone had access to the same networks there would be no elite anymore. If it raises the prospects of the vast majority of Americans by, say, 5%, that would actually be great fo…

advocating the preservation of the elite by gating access to it This statement assumes that there is a fixed amount of wealth that must be protected; it's prevalent in socialist thinking, as well as in the thinking of the poor (it's part of the contagion). It's also 100% incorrect. The creation of wealth is not a zero-sum game.

You are making assumptions about my thinking on this subject. All I'm saying is that the parent commenter is advocating gating access, so as not to "ruin Harvard". Maybe he believes there's a fixed amount of wealth.

Re: What Really Keeps Poor People Poor

#120

Post by khafra »

ctdonath wrote: post #77
iamelgringo wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

May I respectfully suggest that there are very different kinds of poverty, and that not all kinds of poverty are due to cultural choices. I came to the conclusion many years ago that in America poverty is a contagious mindset, nothing more. You are making very, very broad generalizations and stereotyping an entire socio-economic category of people. My parents grew up in rural Minnesota in absolute poverty. My father…

Life is hard to live in a place where life is hard to live. There is some push to discuss "food deserts" as a social problem subject to sociopolitical solutions. Thing is, a desert is what it is because there is little there to sustain life - and the prime way to deal with that, short of either imposing expensive infrastructure or accepting grinding bare-sustenance living, is MOVE: don't be there. Ditto these urban "…

> the solution isn't trying to impose an infrastructure on a system which has a natural resistance thereto, and will require enormous costs with little payback, the solution is to recognize "this is a bad place to exist in" and get out.

You're making it sound like these are two alternative solutions by setting them next to each other, but they aren't. No agent faces the dilemma of improving the desert infrastructure or moving someplace better.

City planners, legislators, etc. can choose to improve living conditions in deserts. Desert residents can choose to leave (of course, even if this does eventually better their situation, the short-term result will be a decrease in living standards).

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