I share this sentiment from the author. I speak "normally", as in to say I don't have a regional accent, and have "white collar" jobs working in IT. Many people assume I am a good middle class person. I often get told I am naive, or stupid for saying things like "rent prices are too expensive" and that when the median income people cannot afford the median priced house we're just growing another bubble. I had a plays…
"Many people assume I am a good middle class person" is what many people consider a "privilege".
Throwaway 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 made it and you can too. Poverty has no color. It impacts everyone. You can't tell just by looking at someone.
And yet statistics disagree with you...
Edit: Nevermind, I saw your other comment. You meant to cheer people up, not make a moral judgment.
The average software engineer makes around 100k. If you have been working for 20+ years, has it been difficult for you to save up enough money for college?
> save up enough money for college Depends on the college. MIT says to expect to spend ~ $70K/year. $100K * 20 years = 2 million. Two kids * 4 years = $560K. That's a little over 1/4 (before taxes). So yes, it would have been difficult to save up that much money. I have enough to send them both to a public in-state school debt-free, but not an elite private school.
My kids are getting to college age and its worth considering that MIT has 11376 students whereas google claims there are 19.6 million college students in the USA at this time. So if distributed purely randomly, in the "everyone MUST go to college" USA, something like 99.942% of kids will not be paying MIT tuition.
Another thing to consider is if you're investing $280K in the MIT brand, do they offer any bachelors degrees worth $280K other than maybe CS and pre-med?
I 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…
Lots of people want to live there. But do the people who live there (and own property there) want lots more people to live there? Not really no.
And in some cases definitely not anywhere near them.
Cities work well at a certain size and population, but the services and infrastructure never get upgraded to match big increases in population like tower blocks.
Not to mention the view from people's houses across the bay will be gone as soon as high rises are built.
If I'm happy with the status quo & I have lots of money, why would I ever stop doing everything possible to maintain it?
Throwaway 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 was poor, received food stamps, stole to eat, and was unemployed selling drugs on the side to make scratch. Now I make half a million a year and I still recognize my privilege, I was a huge outlier. No matter how bad it got, I was still a fairly attractive white male who had been introduced to computing by his single mother as a very small boy and spent my latch key kid time on donated computers. Had I gotten caught up in the criminal justice system as a black man, or interviewed as a black man, or any of that and my success could not have been achieved.
> I made it and you can too. Poverty has no color. It impacts everyone. You can't tell just by looking at someone. I love your story. There's also a ton of people who will delight in cherry-picking your story, as justification for not expanding the social safety net. "throwaway-0987 did it, and you can too! You just need to stop being so lazy" A few factors to consider: - You had an aunt you could live with - As a yo…
3 of the 5 factors you list boil down to "OP made good decisions and worked hard". I'm not sure how that is a counter argument to "throwaway-0987 did it, and you can too! You just need to stop being so lazy". From their description, it doesn't sound like living with his Aunt was a tremendous boon either. I don't mean to argue against a social safety net (free college in this example was certainly a good thing). I jus…
I think the point is, with a middle-class (let alone wealthy) background few of those poor decisions in the youth spiral out into lifetime handicaps.
The part about cars is pretty spot on, I'm upper middle class and I've been able to save so much money by getting rid of my car. On the low end you're going to hit 300 to 500 dollars a month for the privilege of driving. The problem here is America simply isn't built for public transit. But since cars are a status symbol, people still go down to Toyota, or Honda and as long as they can make that first down payment th…
I used to take public transportation that took 2 hours each way to get to my job. Then I bought my first car for $500. It was such great freedom. Then, years later, I moved to the city and was able to get rid of my car. It was great freedom. Then, years later, I got married and had a child. We bought and owned two cars. It was great freedom.
I can kind of relate to it however in my opinion being able to solely rely on public transportation in the city is still the best kind of freedom.
Does it really help to inform someone sharing a story of their privation that they could have had it worse? I mean I am on board with the notion that there are various aspects of privilege, and that someone who had it hard in some dimension might have some privilege in others. But it doesn't seem like an appropriate response in this context.
Read the conclusion again.
The conclusion is that poverty from systemic racism doesn’t exist. I don’t know how he ended up there but now I understand the need for a throwaway.
3 of the 5 factors you list boil down to "OP made good decisions and worked hard". I'm not sure how that is a counter argument to "throwaway-0987 did it, and you can too! You just need to stop being so lazy". From their description, it doesn't sound like living with his Aunt was a tremendous boon either. I don't mean to argue against a social safety net (free college in this example was certainly a good thing). I jus…
> The government can not and should not lift people out of poverty if those people refuse to work to better themselves. I think everyone is deserving of not living in poverty. Even "lazy" people.
For some definition of "deserving", I would agree. Certainly, everyone should have the tools and opportunities they need to build the life they want.
Society has limited resources. Until we manage the post-scarcity utopia, I would prefer my tax dollars go to someone who will use them to build a better life.
you know "free loaders" aren't why most people are homeless right?
It's nowhere near the majority case, but I have definitely met freeloader panhandlers when they were off duty. One was an older couple who made their grandkids put on ratty clothes and hold signs in the city, so they could continue living on the road in their very nice RV. I met them at a campground when I was a kid, and the grandkids accidentally let slip that "the bank" was code for panhandling. The other was clear…
Most of the people I have known that I would label as "freeloaders" seem to have some combination of developmental emotional abuse and mental health issues that are either not diagnosed or not properly medicated. They tend to become homeless of their own accord and tend to blame people for the relationships they destroy.
At first it comes off as entitlement when they assume free access to other people's property, time, and resources when those other people are trying to help. But after a long enough period of direct social involvement it becomes frustratingly clear the behavior is something like a passive non-violent anti-social behavior. It can be sad to watch. Its worse if they have children.