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Being poor vs. being broke

blog.ctms.me

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Re: Being poor vs. being broke

#151

Post by CallMeJim »

dukeofdoom wrote: post #7

It's also owning lower quality goods, that plague you by breaking all the time. So the maintenance cost (time and energy) is quite high. It's almost better not to have things when you're poor, because the things you have are just a big headache. I think it's also that increasingly working people are living in old houses that were never built properly, and now have lots of problems. And even new things you buy, are ju…

How much would you save yearly if you didn't have a dog?

A few accumulated years of those savings would let you buy a better-quality drier or washing machine - saving you from replacing them regularly, or replacing your damaged clothes.

Pets are a choice that's fairly high up the Maslow hierarchy. Get rid of them, get into a better position, build up some reserves, and leave your family in a better place than you started.

Also raise your family so they have the same mindset - they need to leave their children in a better place than they started.

Re: Being poor vs. being broke

#152

Post by dugidugout »

webdood90 wrote: post #89
blizdiddy wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

> I wonder why folks who start with roughly the same skills, intelligence and opportunities (and bank account balance!) can nevertheless end up in very different places? I am answering this question. Perhaps you could reply with something useful instead of attacking my comment.

I think it was:

> IMO it matters little how much you earn if you don't know how to spend it.

which implied you were also commenting on the condition of being "poor", rather than distinguishing those who are "broke" from those who are not with the same pay.

I take it you really mean:

"IMO, after a baseline, it matters little how much you earn if you don't know how to spend it."

Re: Being poor vs. being broke

#153

Post by tekla »

wagwang wrote: post #133
ChrisMarshallNY wrote: post #15

I like this guy’s backstory[0]. I grew up in Africa. The poverty I saw, as a child, was foundational in my own personal development. There are some places in the US, that have that kind of poverty, but I have not seen them, with my own eyes. I have family that dedicated most of their life to fighting poverty (with very limited success). They believe that poverty is probably the single biggest problem in the world, to…

My parents grew up poor in manner that is more extreme than anything OP described in the post and they always remind me that its just hard work and grit.

Both my parents came to America with less than $20 and nothing else but what they wore. I constantly think of how hard they worked to let me live such a leisurely life.

Re: Being poor vs. being broke

#154

Post by [deleted] »

bwhiting2356 wrote: post #114
ChrisMarshallNY wrote: post #15

I like this guy’s backstory[0]. I grew up in Africa. The poverty I saw, as a child, was foundational in my own personal development. There are some places in the US, that have that kind of poverty, but I have not seen them, with my own eyes. I have family that dedicated most of their life to fighting poverty (with very limited success). They believe that poverty is probably the single biggest problem in the world, to…

> But, I absolutely hated working in an office. I also hated what digital marketing has done to people’s privacy. I had to get out. So, after 10 years I left and went back to my roots. I founded a sprinkler contracting business with my brother and work outside all day, every day. And I love it. I don't think this person should be putting themselves in the same category as people who are stuck in poverty with no optio…

[deleted]

Re: Being poor vs. being broke

#155

Post by nyeah »

cluckindan wrote: post #3
rsyring wrote: post #2

https://blog.ctms.me/about/ It would appear from the about page and the article that he has the requisite skills to earn an income that should move him out of the "poor" category: - auto mechanic - digital tech - landscaping I'm not trying to dismiss the difficult realities associated with being poor. But if you have the skills to make more money and bring your family out of the "poor" category, why wouldn't you do t…

[flagged]

It's an obvious conclusion to draw when folks seem to be unaware of the content of the article. But you're not supposed to say it.

Re: Being poor vs. being broke

#156

Post by maerF0x0 »

> A lot of poor folks are having to stand in line for hours and hours to get food at a food bank due to [government] ineptitude

This is an element of the argument for dismantling the nanny bureaucracy and instead going to UBI / cash payments.

1. It doesn't waste time, both of the gov't employee, but also of the recipient.

2. The author could buy better food, or car parts, or a bus pass, or ... with what otherwise might have been a more or less forced purchase in a single category. The flexibility returns agency and self-help behavior into the hands of the recipient.

All this needs to be tempered against the progress[1] we are making against poverty. I know it's a lot to ask the poor to be patient, but I do think there's an element of knowing that a lot of good people are trying really hard to alleviate the situation can help with the mostly mental elements of the article

> No matter how fast you run or how high you jump you can never see the finish line. No matter how tired you are the ground keeps moving.

eg: this statement is not actually a fact, it's a mindset

Overall, this is a big big testament to the overall worldview that I think is missing, just how impactful choices actually are. Some of these kinds of stories start generations ago, some of them start with the individual themselves having spent excess in the past that could have taken them through the low times (kind of "a waste not, want not" scenario). Some folks had opportunity and squandered it. Some flipped tails (failing scenario) 20 times in a row... People don't really want to help the former, but definitely the latter.

[1] - https://x.com/BillGates/status/1086662632587907072/photo/1

Re: Being poor vs. being broke

#157

Post by dbspin »

monero-xmr wrote: post #138
smithkl42 wrote: post #13

The post does a good job of describing a phenomenological difference between being broke and being poor, and its account seems plausible to me. But what I'm curious about is the causal difference between the two. I've known working class folks who seem like they're getting by fine, even if they're occasionally "broke", and I've known working class folks who are constantly in financial crisis, and definitely fit in th…

I’m wealthy but I wasnt always. When I was 22 through 30 I didn’t take a single vacation that wasn’t driving to a long weekend. My wife and I both pulled 60 to 70 hour weeks for our entire 20s (I still do). No one “deserves” free time. If you don’t want to work 70 hours a week and want to watch Netflix instead, go for it, but don’t bitch to me

I'm not sure what this contributes? Not being rich and experiencing absolute poverty are radically different things. Of course, in America as everywhere else, there are millions who work sixty hour weeks and remain in poverty, often extreme poverty. Especially those undocumented, incarcerated or working in circumstances where minimum wages do not apply.

I wonder if you've examined your own evident anger and defensiveness and why you've responded in that way?

Re: Being poor vs. being broke

#158

Post by kylehotchkiss »

> There is this mindset from folks that poor people must not be smart.

Ever since I was a child, that idea has been shoved down my throat. "The American Dream", "they're lazy", "they should work harder".

Spending some serious time in developing countries fixed that mentality up real quick. Being able to escape the circumstances you're born into is a rare privilege in any culture. And that aspect of life in USA seemed to end in the late 90s/early 2000s.

Re: Being poor vs. being broke

#159

Post by potato3732842 »

sgarland wrote: post #70
reaperducer wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are some places in the US, that have that kind of poverty, but I have not seen them, with my own eyes. Americans are very often blind to the poverty in their own backyards. There are hundreds of thousands (millions?) of people in America who do not have electricity or even running water in their homes. I'm always reminded of a photograph from a few years ago in the Navajo Times showing a handful of children sit…

There are Americans who have open sewage in their yards [0], because their counties are predominantly Black or Latino, and their state deprioritizes any infrastructure work. It’s structural racism. Even better, the Trump administration canceled [1] an attempt to right that wrong, citing that it was “DEI.” 0: https://www.huffpost.com/entry/sanitation-open-sewers-black-... 1: https://apnews.com/article/justice-departme…

They're called sewage "lagoons" and work basically the same as septic systems from a environmental impact perspective. They only really work well in certain climates and even then you need to have enough spare land to just locate a sewage pond somewhere. Even in richer areas it was dirt common for schools and prisons (which aren't likely to be located in the center of town like other government stuff is) to have them way deeper into the 20th century than you'd expect since it's not like they were short on land (just use more taxpayer money).

Normally the plumbing runs underground but those people have a trench solution likely because they added a bunch of trailers to the property and more lines were out. There's probably some weird government rules at play here. Like they don't want to dig pipes into the ground because screwing with their grandfathered in lagoon would be "state problems" level illegal whereas right now it's "municipality problems" level illegal and the latter doesn't wanna stomp them with the jackboot for obvious political reasons.

The clean water act and it's knock on rules really act as a huge impediment to "it won't make it compliant, but it will make it a hell of a lot better" fixes in cases like this.

Re: Being poor vs. being broke

#160

Post by vdqtp3 »

aduwah wrote: post #30
WheelsAtLarge wrote: post #11

Very true but I also think that being poor is a mindset to change. I've known of people that would couch surf but they were never poor. We knew, they knew, that at anytime they could turn it around, and they did. They wanted to do things that were not the norm so they chose not to follow society's norms so they lacked money and they lived day to day. Once they changed their mind set they were able to work their way t…

I can give you an example. Single divorced mother with two kids. Working in social care for minimal wage, often earning lower amounts than the people she cares for. There are no savings, no relatives to help. Job change is an uncertainty that could introduce homelessness for the whole family if it doesn't work out. Not many options there. Now if you move this scenario out of rich countries it will get even worse

My mental poster child for "poor" is exactly this person. She had three kids (all in public school), lived in section 8 and worked part-time bagging groceries. The kids had nothing nice, clothes were all hand-me-down or donations with holes in them from being so old. No car, no health care, horrible dentistry to the point of becoming an emergency.

They had a bigger TV than my middle class family, a premium channel package, and ordered pizza not infrequently. I get all the arguments, but when you're working 20 hours a week and living off food stamps and subsidized housing you don't get to have luxuries AND complain about being poor. The person described in TFA as being poor is rare at best.

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