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On the Experience of Being Poor-Ish, for People Who Aren't

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Re: On the Experience of Being Poor-Ish, for People Who Aren't

#671

Post by rafiki6 »

throwaway-0987 wrote: post #174

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…

> If you have never been poor, you may not realize how awesome Small houses and Toyota Corollas are.

Love this. These are luxury products for upper middle class folks in a lot of developing countries. I don't think people really grasp this until they experience it themselves.

Re: On the Experience of Being Poor-Ish, for People Who Aren't

#672

Post by nitrogen »

acdha wrote: post #208
sandworm101 wrote: post #164

Earlier 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…

I think the rest of their post after the part you quoted agrees with your point. So much of the US was designed or redesigned to only work for people who own cars but we still love to talk about them as if they were voluntary expenses ignoring the number of people who are one breakdown or accident away from unemployment & lack of access to healthcare.

What city has public transit that will get you safely and quickly to work at 3AM? What city design will still accomplish all that after your job relocates 15 miles further away?

Re: On the Experience of Being Poor-Ish, for People Who Aren't

#673

Post by ska »

xyzzyz wrote: post #657
ska wrote: post #651

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> How does that work? Because to a first approximation, that's not what ever happens. "Steve" is far more a political talking point than a real person.

Interesting to hear this, when I modeled “Steve” after two people I personally know. One is my family member, and the other is my middle school acquaintance. Their lifestyle is exactly enabled by the money they get from government. Should I believe you, or my own lying eyes?

> Should I believe you, or my own lying eyes?

Neither of course! Either believing your own experience to generalize well or believing someone random on the internet would be crazy talk.

What you should believe is the research on this, which admittedly is difficult with anything this politicized. What I base it on is a combination of reading some of that (though I'm no expert) and knowing some people quite well who have had state level responsibility for programs of this kind.

Fraud, and "Steves" certainly exist, but it seems that the numbers are small enough they don't have much systemic impact, there are many much bigger issues.

That's what I meant by "to a first approximation"; not that it doesn't exist, but the effect isn't of 1st order importance.

Re: On the Experience of Being Poor-Ish, for People Who Aren't

#674

Post by whimsicalism »

criticaljudge wrote: post #622
whimsicalism wrote: post #514

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Half of all private wealth is inherited, not earned through work, by the wealthiest 5% of households. In that context, why focus on giving small portions of wealth to those in poverty (even if they aren't working as hard as you think they ought to)?

The notion that children don't deserve the spoils of their parents is really crazy to me. Parents work so that they can give their children a better life. Heck, they even choose their partners to maximize odds for a better life for their offspring (wealth, good genes, and so on - it does not even depend on capitalism). To take that away from people is truly dehumanizing, but sounds like a typical socialist scheme (de…

So you are only deserving of a life free of poverty (even if you're lazy) if your parents happened to be rich?

Yeah, I disagree. We're talking about on the order of tens of millions of dollars or more being passed from one parent to one child.

Re: On the Experience of Being Poor-Ish, for People Who Aren't

#675

Post by charlesu »

dahfizz wrote: post #459
whack wrote: post #377

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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…

> The government can not and should not lift people out of poverty if those people refuse to work to better themselves.

At some point automation will leave us in a place where many, if not most, people’s labor is literally worthless because they’re not mechanics or engineers. Then what? Should those people starve even as we live in a time of abundance instead of scarcity? At what point does this concept of deservedness do more harm than good?

Re: On the Experience of Being Poor-Ish, for People Who Aren't

#676

Post by whack »

dahfizz wrote: post #459
whack wrote: post #377

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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…

There's an extra layer of nuance missing in your reply. 3 of the 5 factors boil down to "op made good decisions and worked hard" AS A TEENAGER. OP's formula won't work for a 30-year old who is trying to work equally hard and making equally good decisions... if they are saddled with poor educational qualifications, kids to take care of, and/or a criminal history. At which point, we as a society are faced with 2 options:

1. We can tell them it's their own fault for not making great decisions when they were teenagers, and therefore, they deserve to remain stuck in a poverty trap for the rest of their lives

2. Or, we can acknowledge that they are now in a situation where hard work alone is unlikely to solve their problems. And we can provide them with the tools they need to help themselves, and also become more valuable assets to society. For example, subsidized/free college or job training. Free/subsidized childcare. Safe living environments. Better access to healthcare. Better public transit so they can actually get to work. Etc

Re: On the Experience of Being Poor-Ish, for People Who Aren't

#677

Post by lisper »

There is a huge survivorship bias in people's theories of what it takes to succeed economically. Working hard improves your odds, but it is neither necessary nor sufficient for success. Luck plays a huge role, starting with who your parents are.

Nonetheless, the ranks of the successful are chock-full of people who worked hard and who think that they can draw a straight line between their hard work and their success, and that if they can do it, so can anyone. If you are such a person, I urge you to read this:

https://blog.rongarret.info/2009/10/travelogue-beauty-and-de...

Re: On the Experience of Being Poor-Ish, for People Who Aren't

#678

Post by andromeduck »

cammikebrown wrote: post #558
andromeduck wrote: post #432

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is my experience too - almost everyone who hung out with me in the library, computer lab or metal shop seemed to do fairly well for themselves - not like 200k tech job well but like 80k blue collar or white collar when most of us grew up with less than 40k combined household income. Half of us first or second generation immigrants and refugees, lots of broken families, lots of substance abuse, lots from Romania,…

I’m not sure of your age, but for instance, my dad, the sole breadwinner at the time, made $40k/year in 1989 when I was born, which is equivalent to $84k today. So, making $80k now and being raised on $40k/year then are the same thing if you adjust for inflation. (Furthermore, I’d argue healthcare, college, and housing are much more expensive now than they were then.)

I'm 28 now so this was about a decae ago. I personally never expected to make much more than 50k out of college, 100k by 35 career wise until my first internship. I think I can still live quite happily with ~60k by myself or ~90k with a loving family.

Good books and good company were all I had and all I think I'll ever need - that and the satisfaction of a job well done be it a piece of code well written, a field well groomed and raked or a McDonalds well wiped and scrubbed.

Re: On the Experience of Being Poor-Ish, for People Who Aren't

#679

Post by tehwebguy »

BunsanSpace wrote: post #134
ausbah wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

you know "free loaders" aren't why most people are homeless right?

Very location dependant. In my city the majourity of panhandlers you see have homes, and choose not to work and beg on the street. You can tell who's homeless because they don't bother you, they sit in silence, or in front of a shelter. Or they ask for food rather than money. People harassing you for money? Panhandlers. I'm sure it's different in cities that have higher costs of living s.t. a min wage earner can't af…

lmao have you been stalking panhandlers in your city to see where they go at the end of the day?

Re: On the Experience of Being Poor-Ish, for People Who Aren't

#680

Post by andi999 »

playingchanges wrote: post #653
nemothekid wrote: post #548

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "OP made good decisions and worked hard" On a national or even global scale I try to avoid generalizations like this because trivially they don't lead to good policy outcomes. It's almost a little like stock picking. If 5/100 hedge funds make a positive return over the year, my first thought isn't "the other 95 refused to work to better themselves". It's easy to understand this with hedge funds, but people commonly…

I like your analogy but I’m not sure it’s perfect. In the finance world I don’t think anyone would presume to say more work === more success. There is a talent component that is not perfectly replicable across hedge funds. BUT in real life more work very often does equal more success because so many careers really do not require a high level of ‘talent’.

Actually for most funds it is the hindsight component. Your bank sets up 20 funds, and then after two years promotes the ones which performed well.
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