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On the Experience of Being Poor-Ish, for People Who Aren't
271–280 of 920 posts
Re: On the Experience of Being Poor-Ish, for People Who Aren't
#272Throwaway because I don't want my co-workers to know. I was poor. My father left home when I was a kid in middle school. My mom worked part time cleaning houses and left us when she found a new husband. I dropped out of high-school in the 9th grade and went to work. Low paying jobs. I lived with my aunt on the bad side of town. Fast-forward 35 years. Today, I make about 200K per year. I got a GED, went to trade schoo…
Have you considered trauma release (there are many different ways you can do this) in order to get over your fear of being poor?
From the way you're speaking (for want of a better phrase), it sounds like the poverty experience traumatised you, and you're re-living your trauma each day.
Re: On the Experience of Being Poor-Ish, for People Who Aren't
#273The hardest part for me was convincing my partner that price is not equal to value. It took me a decade of arguments and constant proofs to even begin to convince my partner that you can almost always find much better value for much less money. Marketing does such an incredible job at convincing people that price and value are the same thing that it takes tremendous mental effort for people to acknowledge that it's n…
To me everything I see an ad for is automatically tainted forever. If I'm not paying attention, I won't even consider buying anything I've ever seen on TV because it automatically registers as "too expensive". With certain things I've trained myself that "I can afford this easily now", but those are exceptions.
Re: On the Experience of Being Poor-Ish, for People Who Aren't
#274Earlier quoted context omitted.
>> I'm upper middle class and I've been able to save so much money by getting rid of my car. Because you probably have job at a desk with a computer. You don't physically do much and so your per-minute presence at work isn't mandatory. If you are a few minutes late the world is not going to end and your workday rarely starts before 5am. You can handle the ins and outs of public transportation and/or you can afford to…
What about a motorcycle? Cheaper and insurance not required.
I don't have much confidence in most people being able to drive a car. While motorcycles do look really cool, it's just not something most people can safely do
Re: On the Experience of Being Poor-Ish, for People Who Aren't
#275Earlier quoted context omitted.
Your general story of poor-to-doing-well is the majority story in the US (not sure of other countries). Income mobility is a huge thing in the US, a great feature that I see mentioned very little outside of academics. Something like 80% of people will be in the top 10% of earners at some point in their lifetime, and 98% of people will be in the top 50%. "poor" and "rich" are not static labels, and they vary greatly e…
That claim doesn’t even pass the sniff test. The idea that 80% of people - which must include those born into multi generational deprived families just by numbers alone - suddenly find themselves for a period of time on the other side of the glass ceiling of poverty, it’s outrageous. I’d love to be corrected on this.
Walkedaway is exaggerating a claim made by the conservative American Enterprise Institute:
https://www.aei.org/carpe-diem/some-amazing-findings-on-inco...
This is how they counter all the talk about the 1%. They suggest that 56% of people will be in the top 10% for one year or more. In their entire working lives.
Distortions include:
-income is not wealth
-some kinds of income are very uneven year-over-year
-jumping into the top bracket for only one year doesn't indicate income or class mobility
-most of the top 1% of income do in fact stay in the top 1% of income
People who earn a lot in one year but don't become wealthy may include:
-actors who get one TV commercial
-waiters at high-end restaurants who burn out
-realtors who get a few good sales in a row
-victims of disabling accidents receiving large insurance payouts
-oil and other trade workers in Alaska
-minor lottery winners
-people cashing in a retirement fund to deal with emergency spending
The fact that America is a land of random windfalls doesn't help with social mobility. A family with multi-generational poverty gets a windfall and immediately has to spend it just trying to catch up a bit.
Re: On the Experience of Being Poor-Ish, for People Who Aren't
#276Queue my first truck. My uncle gave it to me. S-15. The bench seat didn’t lock, it slid forward and back when breaking or accelerating. Hard left hand turn and the keys would fly from the ignition and land on tue floorboard of the passenger seat (this did not turn off the truck). During the same hard left, some electrical thing would connect or un-short and my radio would temporarily turn on until the end of the turn…
Does the US or California not have some sort of annual check to ensure that cars on the road are roadworthy? Something like https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MOT_test
in maryland you can just pay a nominal fee/fine each month to defer your emissions test. it adds up, but it takes a long time to equal the cost of replacing a catalytic converter.
Re: On the Experience of Being Poor-Ish, for People Who Aren't
#277I have a possibly stupid question... Parts of america have really really high housing costs... like really high... and a bunch of people want to live there, and a lot of people there are poor (atleast compared to housing prices). Why the hell do you still build single family houses, or one/two floor buildings in areas where you need to fit a bunch of people (eg. both photos in the article)? I'm from a former socialis…
The answer for a city like San Francisco is all the available land was built on 70 years ago (with a few exceptions).
Re: On the Experience of Being Poor-Ish, for People Who Aren't
#278Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yes, according to one of my old economics teachers, above the subsistence level, happiness is approximately how much better off you are than your neighbors.
If you choose to play that game. In my experience focusing on what you need to be happy and ignoring your neighbors is a better recipe for happiness and a whole lot cheaper.
A quote about personal happiness that has lived with me for some time: "comparison is the thief of joy"
Re: On the Experience of Being Poor-Ish, for People Who Aren't
#279Earlier quoted context omitted.
you know "free loaders" aren't why most people are homeless right?
in one specific case I will willingly describe where that is precisely the reality that needs to be faced. (hardly gladly will I recount my experiences, I am barely past the stages of pure shock, I became homeless as the result of extensive almost decade long criminal harassment following when I accidentally uncovered a systematic fraud in government. ironically - actually I am pretty sure intentionally - the fraud i…
Your comment is very difficult to read and understand. The sentences are too long and borders on purple prose. There are too many strands of thought packed into a single sentence.
I understand you are saying that you discovered some potential government fraud, and that homeless Londoners are being recruited by organised criminals, but not how the two are related.
Re: On the Experience of Being Poor-Ish, for People Who Aren't
#280Throwaway because I don't want my co-workers to know. I was poor. My father left home when I was a kid in middle school. My mom worked part time cleaning houses and left us when she found a new husband. I dropped out of high-school in the 9th grade and went to work. Low paying jobs. I lived with my aunt on the bad side of town. Fast-forward 35 years. Today, I make about 200K per year. I got a GED, went to trade schoo…
I very much enjoyed reading your post. You made a statement that, taken literally, I disagree with and wonder if you care to elaborate more on it. I made it and you can too. It seems to me that luck plays a huge role in each success story like yours. My wife had a similar trajectory and makes quite a bit of money. However, along the way, there were hundreds of decisions made that could have gone the wrong way. She's…
I think it’s not so much luck, but perseverance. I have a similar poor upbringing and I have built a pretty comfortable life by never letting myself get too down and always keep working towards a better life. Being smart helps, but really the best thing that works for me is being okay with failure. When you’re poor you fail a lot, being able to take that failure and learn from it separates the successful and the unsuccessful. If you’re rich none of this matters because life isn’t fair.