The article doesn't delve into recovery. I would love to see some analysis on what it will take to lower the poverty rate back down, and for the small businesses that were forced to close to recover. How likely is it that we will see small businesses return?
U.S. Suffers Sharpest Rise in Poverty Rate in More Than 50 Years
191–200 of 252 posts
Re: U.S. Suffers Sharpest Rise in Poverty Rate in More Than 50 Years
#192Earlier quoted context omitted.
Genuine question: how can poor whites join with POC, given how the systemic racial injustice narrative has developed? I would be worried about a “this protest isn’t about your situation, white person” response. (Given the current tenor)
> I would be worried about a “this protest isn’t about your situation, white person” response. (Given the current tenor) A genuine question of my own: what has planted this worry in your mind? What tenor do you speak of? The demographics of the US mean that any policy that POC want to enact has to also be supported by enormous numbers of white people; that POC-friendly policies have ever passed is evidence that worki…
There is the widely accepted concept of an ally. You could be one. You'll be a second-class citizen. You'll have to supplicate for your place. For the 'space you take up' as they like to say. You'll need to keep up with the latest woke thinking on TikTok and Twitter, so you know how you're expected to think, believe, feel, speak, and act, in order to keep your probationary status as an ally. And it'll always be probationary. I'm not going to, but you could.
Ah, if only it was actually about empathizing and showing respect. Wouldn't that be something.
Re: U.S. Suffers Sharpest Rise in Poverty Rate in More Than 50 Years
#193Earlier quoted context omitted.
You'll notice that the rise in media reporting on systematic racism correlates strongly with the rise in discussions about class difference, industry trends, globalization, etc. The latter was Bernie Sander's platform before he was "challenged" by BLM during the 2016 primary. Not to imply that Sanders didn't previously support BLM, but he rhetoric changed after that. It was clear to me that Sanders thought the primar…
My mind is blown. But I'm an anticonspiracy theorist. What can explain why race differences move us so much more than class?
If you're genuinely asking, it's because:
- Race is immutable, and can't be faked
- Race is linked to genetics (ingroup preference increases YOUR genetic proliferation)
- For millions of years, we've done it this way (there were no class problems in prehistoric times)
Re: U.S. Suffers Sharpest Rise in Poverty Rate in More Than 50 Years
#194Earlier quoted context omitted.
Inequality is not a bad thing. It's actually necessary to have inequality of outcomes otherwise you have no incentives for improvement. An example of a society with very low inequality is old-school communism where most people are equally poor - it's clearly not a good thing. What is bad is extreme inequality where a lot of people are in poverty. I think most people would agree that poverty is a bad thing that we sho…
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It is possible to have very high inequality and [pick one] comfortable/uncomfortable poor people.
How much someone has relative to their neighbour doesn't control their quality of life.
Re: U.S. Suffers Sharpest Rise in Poverty Rate in More Than 50 Years
#195This and a spiraling mental health crisis are predictable outcomes from poor public health policies executed during the pandemic. For unskilled labor jobs like the service industry, lockdowns are devastating which has fueled the inequality fire in 2020. Now, talks for a massive federal minimum wage increase means further sending people into poverty by destroying the value of what small savings anyone on the bottom mi…
I might be wrong, but I suspect that if this pandemic had hit before remote working technology had become widespread amongst professionals and white collar elites, there wouldn't have been such an aggressive, broad lock-down strategy.
Instead, the people with power and influence, like us, felt minimal pain compared to the working classes, and marched on with our policies in bliss.
Meanwhile, my family (I grew up in a working class rural family) has suffered tremendously back "home". I'm ok with what's necessary, but deeply resent the politically safe strategy of overreacting by default.
If you live in California, you may be interested to learn that elementary schools are open in states like Colorado, and these states universally have lower rates of infection than CA. You may also be interested to know that a study published by the American Academy of Pediatrics (those quacks!), conducted jointly by Duke/UNC, following 100,000 students and faculty in North Carolina public schools, conclusively determined that schools can be opened safely with basic PPE and adjustments in scheduling. https://www.aappublications.org/news/2021/01/08/covid-north-...
From the study: "During the nine-week study period, the 11 districts reported 773 community-acquired infections. Typically, people in North Carolina who are infected have infected slightly more than one other person, meaning there was the potential for 800 to 900 secondary infections within the schools. However, local public health officials found only 32 in-school transmissions, according to the study.
Of those 32 cases, six were in pre-kindergarten, 11 were in elementary schools, six were in middle schools, five were in high schools and four were in schools that included kindergarten through 12th grade. None of the cases involved a child infecting an adult."
My daughter and son are both enrolled and attending in-person school here in Colorado, and it's gone smoothly. I'm curious as to what dynamics exist in California school buildings that would be different than my kid's school buildings, and can't think of any. Which makes me strongly suspect that California and certain other places have schools closed out of an overabundance of caution that doesn't take into account the holistic costs of keeping them closed.
Re: U.S. Suffers Sharpest Rise in Poverty Rate in More Than 50 Years
#196Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's pretty obvious that there has been an enlarging wealth gap and poverty rate has increased. What I don't understand is that the current narrative is to attribute such unfortunate events to systemic racism. Shouldn't we at least look at class difference, shift of industry trend, impact of policies, i.e., take the holistic view?
I contend that the real tragedy of American politics is that what ought to be class/labor issues gets sidetracked into race issues. If poor whites would stop thinking in terms of race and instead think in terms of class and economic justice then real progress could be made. Lyndon Johnson had a famous quote about just this. https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/lbj-convince-the-lowest-wh...
This is a surreal reversal of the situation.
Upper-class whites are obsessed with race, especially in the last few years.
Every news story - and the news comes from the upper whites - gets twisted into something about race, as in this case. Every tech company, every Hollywood studio, every academic institution are vibrating with energy to find and fight racism; overflowing with programs and policies about race. Hell, even the Oscars can't be won by white guys making movies about white guys any more - it's in the rules!
Here's the evidence https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2019/06/th...
To say it's the poor whites who are "thinking in terms of race" too much is utterly absurd. Where's the evidence that they're thinking in terms of race more than the academics or NYT? You'll hear way more about race in a random sample of discussions at the NYT than you possibly could at a NASCAR event.
The people thinking too much in terms of race are the upper-class whites, and they do this to justify their superiority over the lower whites by borrowing morality points from the (in this narrative) victimized non-whites.
Re: U.S. Suffers Sharpest Rise in Poverty Rate in More Than 50 Years
#197Alternative title: "events of 2020 case poverty rate to regress to 2017/2018 levels" Frankly I'm surprised the effect was so small considering that the industries hit hardest by covid employ a heck of a lot of people who are near the poverty line to begin with. I would expect all those people to be pushed to the other side of the line resulting in a much more dramatic increase in the poverty rate.
> Frankly I'm surprised the effect was so small Only because of the moratorium on evictions, which is deferring a lot of financial pain till later, and thereby making today's numbers look a lot better than they are. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-12-10/u-s-house...
Why would evictions impact the poverty rate? Isn't it just the share of people who fall under a certain level of income, without directly accounting for things like housing insecurity?
Re: U.S. Suffers Sharpest Rise in Poverty Rate in More Than 50 Years
#198Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don't know why we always go back to income inequality, it's not a useful metric. What matters is how many people are living good, prosperous lives. You can have have income equality simply by keeping everyone equally poor, or you can have prosperous societies where some people have a lot more than others, but everyone is doing well. Income inequality is only meaningful if the amount if wealth and prosperity in a so…
> I don't know why we always go back to income inequality Because it's pretty well established that outside of the most abject poverty, relative deprivation is a more significant factor driving experienced disutility than absolute material condition, contrary to the naive assumptions many people make that increasing individual absolute material condition increases individual utility independent of external context. T…
> ... relative deprivation is a more significant factor driving experienced disutility than absolute material condition ...
Which data are you talking about? Because on the one hand, yes. On the other hand most of the data I'm aware of is very context- (especially social-situation-) specific. I don't think there is evidence that the simple existence somewhere out there of very wealthy people is upsetting.
Re: U.S. Suffers Sharpest Rise in Poverty Rate in More Than 50 Years
#199Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Frankly I'm surprised the effect was so small Only because of the moratorium on evictions, which is deferring a lot of financial pain till later, and thereby making today's numbers look a lot better than they are. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-12-10/u-s-house...
Why would evictions impact the poverty rate? Isn't it just the share of people who fall under a certain level of income, without directly accounting for things like housing insecurity?
I think most directly, when people get evicted, they are at greater risk of losing their job.
Re: U.S. Suffers Sharpest Rise in Poverty Rate in More Than 50 Years
#200Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's pretty obvious that there has been an enlarging wealth gap and poverty rate has increased. What I don't understand is that the current narrative is to attribute such unfortunate events to systemic racism. Shouldn't we at least look at class difference, shift of industry trend, impact of policies, i.e., take the holistic view?
I contend that the real tragedy of American politics is that what ought to be class/labor issues gets sidetracked into race issues. If poor whites would stop thinking in terms of race and instead think in terms of class and economic justice then real progress could be made. Lyndon Johnson had a famous quote about just this. https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/lbj-convince-the-lowest-wh...
It sounds like you're saying that the poor whites are the one pushing the systematic racism view of the problem. Since it seems clear to me that that's not the case, I am confused by this view. Am I misunderstanding what you're saying?
Edit: Since this got downvoted already, I'll try to clarify? I'm confused by what appears to be the opinion of the poster and asking for clarification so that I can better understand them. If you're going to downvote me, at least be helpful and provide some sort of answer to the question.
Edit: Changed the word agenda to "view of the problem", since it's possible that was being interpreted in a way it wasn't meant.