Being poor vs. being broke

Well, the thing wagwang's parents did that improved the well-being of the people after them was to leave China.

What the Chinese society had been collectively doing for the previous ten years, however, was creating "the deadliest famine and one of the greatest man-made disasters in human history, with an estimated death toll due to starvation that ranges in the tens of millions (15 to 55 million)." And the following ten years included the first six years of the Cultural Revolution:

> Estimates of the death toll vary widely, typically ranging from 1–2 million, including a massacre in Guangxi that included acts of cannibalism, as well as massacres in Beijing, Inner Mongolia, Guangdong, Yunnan, and Hunan. Red Guards sought to destroy the Four Olds (old ideas, old culture, old customs, and old habits), which often took the form of destroying historical artifacts and cultural and religious sites. Tens of millions were persecuted, including senior officials such as Liu Shaoqi, Deng Xiaoping and Peng Dehuai; millions were persecuted for being members of the Five Black Categories, with intellectuals and scientists labelled as the Stinking Old Ninth. The country's schools and universities were closed, and the National College Entrance Examinations were cancelled.

I don't think any of that can be accurately described as "everybody else doing unpleasant things for a while to improve the well-being of everyone after them."

Chinese history, including in the 20th century, includes many of the brightest stars that have ever illuminated human history, and after the Cultural Revolution, a meteoric rise out of poverty, led by the same Deng Xiaoping whose son was tortured and crippled by Red Guards in the Cultural Revolution. But specifically in 01962 "everybody" was creating that poverty and worsening the well-being of everyone after them.

OK, one of my clients is a payday lender in a wealthy country. I have the complete banking histories of 10s of thousands of low income people in front of me.

I insist that the distinguishment proposed in the article is BS.

There is a small subset of clients with disabilities AND absense of insurance/government pensions, whose situation is permanent for all intents and purposes. But everyone else, one-off clients as well as regulars have ups and downs, and get through defaults or manage to repay their debt at times. Gambling and alcohol are a clear factor (drug abuse is harder to identify on someone's bank statement), but cases such as divorce from a partner with abuse problems bring relief most of the time. Children grow up or grow older and require less work or even generate income of their own.

I know it's different, when you live in a low income country and everyone around is poor and scamming people on the internet or marine piracy are the only possible access options to wealth, but that's a different topic.

I can appreciate the totally different perspective that must bring. I would also add that living in a car-centered society where you are expected to have a car presents its own set of challenges, namely that you can't afford to live near food sources (grocery stores, etc.) or jobs because it's expected that people drive to those things. For people in those situations struggling to make ends meet, I think they view their car more as a required liability they struggle to maintain rather than a privilege.

The other crime in that photo is the lack of cell service, despite billions of dollars that the USG has given ATT/Verizon/T-Mo over the years.

But these phone companies just give unfettered access to their networks to the various TLAs and everybody ignores the fact that they are not providing the cell service they are contractually obligated to.

Poverty-sculpted packrat brain here. I believe this specific behavior became a nuanced social issue starting with the Marie Kondo "Cleanliness" movement from years ago to present, at least my experience of this is through the Tumblr commentaries about how tone-deaf the movement was to people in or who grew up in poverty. so for "never-poor" people like you, the specific nuance would be whether you had space to keep these backup parts like an attic or garage or even extra closet space where this behavior becomes a "tidiness/organization" issue otherwise. hope this perspective gives a better picture