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How to live on $432 a month in America

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Re: How to live on $432 a month in America

#321

Post by [deleted] »

digianarchist wrote: post #227
sweeter wrote: post #220

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's absurd. I work full time in the richest country on Earth and I can't afford an apartment and healthcare. The problem is clearly not advertising. Real "billionaire goes homeless for one night to prove the stupid poors are lazy and stupid and need to hedge their expectations" type of energy

We're all being asked to sacrifice the living standards our parents grew up with because the utter failure of local, state and federal government to provide housing, public transit, education and healthcare, something most of the Western world manages to pull off without issue. We have never been more productive in this country's history and yet we cannot even meet a bar set in the 1950s. It's frankly ridiculous as i…

[deleted]

Re: How to live on $432 a month in America

#322

Post by RajT88 »

sandworm101 wrote: post #315
fullStackOasis wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> hope you don't need to see a doctor for anything serious, or go to a dentist for that mater. That's the first thing I thought about. His budget of $432/mo doesn't include health insurance. But $5K/y probably gets him Medicaid eligibility. Let's assume he's on Medicaid, then. In NY state, that covers quite a lot of dental care, if you believe this: https://www.health.ny.gov/health_care/medicaid/program/denta... Not…

>> But $5K/y probably gets him Medicaid eligibility. Let's assume he's on Medicaid, then. If he is on medicaid then he isn't "living" on 432/month. That would be living on 432/month PLUS whatever medicaid is worth, likely well north of another 500/month. Then the kids need schooling, either in-person or remote. that is another 10k/year/kid. And you need some sort of local police/justice system to ensure nobody boots…

> That would be living on 432/month PLUS whatever medicaid is worth, likely well north of another 500/month.

Well, not for long at this rate.

Re: How to live on $432 a month in America

#323

Post by jvanderbot »

QuarterReptile wrote: post #300
jvanderbot wrote: post #288

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Any discussion of staying near family and friends on a forum predominated by startups out of the bay area is completely disingenuous. But that aside, I suggest this is front page and meaningful not because it brings up a third option (to stay home, move to a city, or move to rural NY), but instead because it advocates accidentally for just staying home . Your family probably already lives in an area that is more affo…

"Disingenuous" is a bridge too far (and worth mentioning because it impugns intent.) It's easy to get drawn to the cities with friends and high pay, then feel like path dependency precludes one from returning to the lower COL hometown. You tell your story in the third and fourth paragraphs because you find it worthy of mention.

You're right, bad word choice.

But yeah, this lifestyle is mostly madness. I watched others stay at home and they have decades of memories, families, and paid off houses. Grass is greener.

Re: How to live on $432 a month in America

#324

Post by andrekandre »

digianarchist wrote: post #227
sweeter wrote: post #220

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's absurd. I work full time in the richest country on Earth and I can't afford an apartment and healthcare. The problem is clearly not advertising. Real "billionaire goes homeless for one night to prove the stupid poors are lazy and stupid and need to hedge their expectations" type of energy

We're all being asked to sacrifice the living standards our parents grew up with because the utter failure of local, state and federal government to provide housing, public transit, education and healthcare, something most of the Western world manages to pull off without issue. We have never been more productive in this country's history and yet we cannot even meet a bar set in the 1950s. It's frankly ridiculous as i…

  > utter failure of local, state and federal government to provide housing, public transit, education and healthcare
i guess the expectation in the (for lack of a better word) neoliberal era was these would be provided by the private sector?

Re: How to live on $432 a month in America

#326

Post by 7thaccount »

trollbridge wrote: post #197
anon7000 wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, medium cities that aren’t shitty and still have some vibrancy are a solid middle ground. Bonus points for being somewhere close to nice natural areas or outdoor recreation. But I grew up in a town of less than 5k in the Midwest. The nearest cities and towns were all less than 50k population. Rent is, of course, incredibly low. There are even dozens of small universities in the area. The nearest city of 100k plu…

When I lived in NYC, it was a given it would take at least an hour to get to an airport, and then I’d budget an extra hour for something to go wrong. Driving to smaller airports - just arrive 50 minutes before departure.

Yep. My airport has less than 20 gates and is a 30 minute drive and 10 minutes to get through security. You frequently have to fly through hubs though.

Re: How to live on $432 a month in America

#327

Post by alexpotato »

I remember reading about a family with 4 kids who lived in a one bedroom house.

The kids slept in two sets of bunk beds in the bedroom. The parents slept on a pull out couch in the living room.

I’m not saying I want to live that way. Just pointing out that people have lived that way before.

Re: How to live on $432 a month in America

#328

Post by BenjiWiebe »

justinrubek wrote: post #126
jeffbee wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In what way is wood free? To heat even a tiny home purpose-built for high efficiency you'd need several acres of woods to sustainably harvest. For a falling-apart $30k hovel in upstate NY you'd probably need more like 15 acres, and you don't get a 15-acre stand of woods in the deal for that price.

Who said anything about sustainability? My parents would heat their home this way. Actually, I think they still do. They'd gather all sorts of wood from fallen trees on other peoples' land as a sort of "service" aka- they haul it away and you don't deal with it. Is it worth the cost savings? I highly doubt it. They're just not good with managing time/money.

There's a guy around here (central Kansas) that charges money to clean up unwanted trees or hedge rows (tree row between fields). He then turns around and sells the firewood.

From what I can tell both of his services are pretty popular.

Re: How to live on $432 a month in America

#329

Post by 7thaccount »

keiferski wrote: post #19
7thaccount wrote: post #15

Earlier 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…

No one that lives in New York goes to Times Square, save for the subway station. The great thing about New York is the prevalence of basically every nationality, with its own designated neighborhood. Places like Flushing, Corona, Brighton Beach, etc. These are also the areas that inexperienced tourists don’t visit. If you visit again, definitely try to venture out to those areas.

Thanks. Yeah, if I do go back it won't be in Manhattan. I was alarmed by how every place was pretty much closed by 6-8 PM near me. Again...my medium city has plenty of cool stuff open much later -especially on a Friday/Saturday night.

Re: How to live on $432 a month in America

#330

Post by 7thaccount »

RHSeeger wrote: post #61
7thaccount wrote: post #15

Earlier 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…

With the caveat that I've only really visited a dozen or so states, and only lived in 2, my experience is pretty different than yours. NYC pizza (and even north of the city) is generally a step above most other places. You can find similar quality pizza most places if you look hard enough, but it's nice being able to stop almost anywhere in NY and get good pizza, better than the best you'll find without having to do…

What did you find interesting about times square? I'm asking seriously as there isn't anything to do other than shop or ignore the annoying 50 people on every street corner asking me to get a bus tour.
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