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How to live on $432 a month in America
201–210 of 764 posts
Re: How to live on $432 a month in America
#202> any American could live an earlier iteration of the American Dream If (and only if) you aren't socially different from the communities you'd be moving to. Being gay or trans, for instance, might mark you out as a target in a lot of the places where you could live this cheaply. Plenty of race, religions, or political beliefs that would make it untenable. It's hard to claim that any American can achieve this.
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Okay so they should go back in the closet?
Re: How to live on $432 a month in America
#203>Though I and my wife do not presently live in Massena, we live nearby, and we’re doing exactly this — we do not have an automobile, nor do we want one. We use the rural county transit bus, which we have found to be extremely cheap and quite reliable; and it has certainly saved us thousands and thousands of dollars by liberating us from the onerous expense of keeping a car. This part has me screaming shenanigans. Unl…
That’s obviously not true, if you change what you “have” to go to. There are thousands of American towns that are about 10k population - large enough to have a Walmart and other stores, small enough to walk across in an hour or so.
Once it gets cold you won't be walking much anywhere. I guess grocery delivery from Walmart can mitigate this, but that fundamentally changes the situation.
Re: How to live on $432 a month in America
#204Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yeah, leaving the "heat" part of the list just blank is pretty telling as far as how much thought went into this.
At 4 cents per 1kWh heating will not be an issue, even with regular resistive heater. It’s almost free electricity. You could run a 1.5 kW heater 24/7 for roughly 40 USD a month. Just make sure the space is well insulated and not too large - but we’re talking about basic living, so that should be easy.
So > 10% of your budget goes to heat in cold months.
Re: How to live on $432 a month in America
#205I think the author is arguing against their own point with the illustration they chose. The very last picture can be found in the Wikipedia page for the Homestead Act and, two jumps later, one can find themselves in the Dutch version of "Sod house" [1] which has this to say: > The living conditions there were miserable. Due to the construction method, the room was difficult to heat, it was damp and teeming with vermi…
The point could be taken in the other way, as in "hey at least you don't have to live in a house made of dirt, right?" Comparably you are much better off, so there is no point in complaining. They made it work. Sure it wasn't great, but we're all passed that now, standards are much better.
Re: How to live on $432 a month in America
#206I looked through those numbers, and immediately thought to myself - hope you don't need to see a doctor for anything serious, or go to a dentist for that mater. FWIW, I grew up in rural nowhere (population 150, nearest town 45 miles away) - and I honestly don't know how anyone can live out in the boonies without a car. Taking the bus that goes 3 times a day is one thing, needing to move stuff is another thing. I mean…
I will say, at this income level you're on Medicaid. It would be more than nothing but very basic, and if you're using government assistance than you aren't really "escaping" modernity, you're actually living off of the economic surplus of all the people working hard in the rat race. (Don't misinterpret me as saying that social safety nets are bad, I am all for them, but I'm just saying - if the author of this articl…
> But it is extremely important to point out that the American "rat race" cities 100% subsidize areas like this.
It's even more important to point out that places like this grow the food and do the manufacturing that those "cities" you like would collapse without.
Re: How to live on $432 a month in America
#207The US is packed with vacant infrastructure over hundreds of dying cities where you can get a nice home that has electricity, water and sewer and trash removal and schools etc...for dirt cheap.
You could make the payment trading options with an almost meager portfolio. Evil stock market and corporations could buy you a free house.
Re: How to live on $432 a month in America
#208I looked through those numbers, and immediately thought to myself - hope you don't need to see a doctor for anything serious, or go to a dentist for that mater. FWIW, I grew up in rural nowhere (population 150, nearest town 45 miles away) - and I honestly don't know how anyone can live out in the boonies without a car. Taking the bus that goes 3 times a day is one thing, needing to move stuff is another thing. I mean…
What small town even has a bus? The closest bus line to me is in the closest large town (40k) about an hour away. Are there bus lines in the middle of nowhere?
Granted, this was 20 years ago, but I remember taking the Greyhound and people were getting on or off the bus in the middle of nowhere. By nowhere, I mean the nowhere in the literal sense: at the intersection of two highways in the northern Ontario with no other development in sight. Of course, they also serviced the other types of nowhere: the lone gas station or the tiny village.
The author is being somewhat misleading in the sense that this is not the type of bus service that one would use for your weekly commute to that 10 hour shift at the gas station, never mind the three or four times per week that you would need to cover the bills. It may be fine doing errands in town, where the arrival time and departure time don't much matter. It may also be fine for spending a day or two in the city, assuming you have the budget to stay over night.
I'm not saying that the type of lifestyle alluded to is impossible, but it is not going to be the type of lifestyle accessible to young people. Then there is the question about whether they are equipped to live that type of lifestyle.
Re: How to live on $432 a month in America
#209In the 4th paragraph the author suggests that the economic backbone of the country - young people - simply desert economic centres of growth and prosperity and to instead assume a life of poverty in a rural teardown. A life substantially worse than their parents live, simply because their parents don’t want more homes near their own home.
I didn’t bother to check if the article gets any more serious from there.
Re: How to live on $432 a month in America
#210Earlier quoted context omitted.
I recently visited New York City for the first time and honestly wasn't impressed. Outside of a few neat things like visiting the cronut place, I could do nearly everything the same back home. The bagel places were indeed good, but not noticeably different than the hipster bagel places in my city. Wood fired pizza was good at several places, but again...none were noticeably different than the wood fired oven fancy pl…
NYC lives on the fumes of its former reputation. Corporate chains have changed the city into basically a shopping mall. When I was a kid I was drawn to NYC by the little hole in the wall restaurants, delis, coffee shops, funky stores. All owned and frequented by colorful local people. Technically these things still exist but they're mostly corporate chain versions of what used to be there. The unique experiences that…
This isn't a good take. When was the last time you lived in NYC? Surely maybe there were glory days at one point, but there used to be a LOT more crime too. NYC is still one of the all time great cities.