Nearly 8M Americans have fallen into poverty since summer • Hacker News Board

Re: Nearly 8M Americans have fallen into poverty since summer

#241

Post by save_ferris » Thu, Dec 17, 2020, 3:27 PM UTC

ryathal wrote: post #228

toomuchtodo wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also can’t sell or trade your car to downgrade if you need a car, as if you need financing to get the next car, you’re not going to qualify for the loan if you’re without employment. Your car is a trailing indicator of your financial situation, not necessarily present state.

Financing cars is a poverty trap. There are cars in the 1-2k range that work perfectly fine and will reliably work with minimal maintenance, and there are sub 1k cars that run ok enough that you can use as a bridge to save enough for a slightly better car. Financing a car is a double whammy because you pay interest and have a deprecating asset. At the low end cars really don't deprecate much. The act of not having a…

> There are cars in the 1-2k range that work perfectly fine and will reliably work with minimal maintenance

> At the low end cars really don't deprecate much

I tried the whole Tropical MBA buy-an-old-car thing. Went with a 10-year-old Camry that KBB'd around $5k, had it inspected before I purchased it, and everything seemed fine. 6 months in, I ran into an issue that required the entire electrical system to be replaced which pretty much totaled the car. I wound up getting about 15% of what I paid for the car back out of it after 6 months of ownership.

Bottom line is that the old car napkin math works as long as the vehicle doesn't run into serious issues, because the moment it does, it really doesn't make much sense unless you're willing and able to do serious work on your own car.

Re: Nearly 8M Americans have fallen into poverty since summer

#242

Post by ardy42 » Thu, Dec 17, 2020, 3:28 PM UTC

nradov wrote: post #207

ardy42 wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> State governments have the power to pay people to stay home. They might have to shift funding from other areas or raise taxes in order to do so. But they don't have the money to do so. Plans like that require deficit spending, which the federal government can do but the states can't. Your alternative suggestions are not serious ideas. Do you really think the states could find the money to pay people to stay home by…

I am seriously suggesting that if states want to pay people to stay home they should find the money by cutting other spending, selling assets, raising taxes on the wealthy (households with an income over about $200K who didn't receive a stimulus payment in the first place), and issuing general obligation bonds. Some states have legal restrictions on those things but those are entirely self imposed and can be removed…

> I am seriously suggesting that if states want to pay people to stay home they should find the money by cutting other spending, selling assets, raising taxes on the wealthy (households with an income over about $200K who didn't receive a stimulus payment in the first place), and issuing general obligation bonds.

So, basically, you think they should do things like finance their house with their credit card (general obligation bonds) instead of taking out a mortgage (federal deficit spending)? And what's your reason for that?

Honestly, this seems more like you're opposed to stay at home orders directly, but expressing that opposition indirectly by demanding arbitrary (unreasonable) policy restrictions to make them seems less desirable by making their implementation unnecessarily painful and difficult.

Re: Nearly 8M Americans have fallen into poverty since summer

#243

Post by JamesBarney » Thu, Dec 17, 2020, 3:29 PM UTC

pen2l wrote: post #238

rayiner wrote: post #234

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Latino/Latina are from Spanish. The words are gendered because it’s a gendered language. When non-Spanish speakers change it to Latinx it comes across as them declaring Spanish as problematic and “fixing” someone else’s language for them. There is also a class/education issue. It’s a term originating in academia that non-college educated people have mostly never heard of. Being called by a label that you don’t recogn…

Don't entirely agree with what some of what you've said but upvoting you nevertheless as clearly you argue in good faith (and to get you out of negative score), that aside -- you say: > It’s a term originating in academia that non-college educated people have mostly never heard of. Being called by a label that you don’t recognize is alienating. Okay, so the word is an academic construct. But it comes from a good plac…

Rayiner is making an argument about whether politicians should use the word. He argued no and I think that's right.

You're trying to pull him into a separate argument which is should individuals use latinx or latino. (The obvious answer here is to use whatever word who you're talking to would prefer)

Re: Nearly 8M Americans have fallen into poverty since summer

#244

Post by xyzzyz » Thu, Dec 17, 2020, 3:36 PM UTC

jahaja wrote: post #239

xyzzyz wrote: post #237

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Imagine if a US presidential candidate were insisting on using the term “Americanxs” every time they referred to their voters.

What would be the point of that? "Americans" is already gender neutral?

And what do you think is the “gender neutral” term that Spanish speakers use when they refer to group of people of Latin American origin? It surely is not “latinxs”.

“What would be point of that?”, yes, that’s exactly the issue. It would seem weird, forced and foreign, just like “latinxs” does to people it is purported to refer to.

Re: Nearly 8M Americans have fallen into poverty since summer

#245

Post by ryathal » Thu, Dec 17, 2020, 3:38 PM UTC

maxerickson wrote: post #231

ryathal wrote: post #228

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Financing cars is a poverty trap. There are cars in the 1-2k range that work perfectly fine and will reliably work with minimal maintenance, and there are sub 1k cars that run ok enough that you can use as a bridge to save enough for a slightly better car. Financing a car is a double whammy because you pay interest and have a deprecating asset. At the low end cars really don't deprecate much. The act of not having a…

Financing part of a $10,000 vehicle is incredibly cheap right now. A few hundred dollars total to borrow for several years.

Financing a 10k car is "cheap" if you have decent credit and aren't rolling negative equity from another car into that. Using average rates it represents a 10-15% additional cost over the principal, and you end up with a car worth about half that. With a 60 month loan you "spent" $6-7k to have a car for those 5 years, if you keep it another 5 years the numbers look better.

Re: Nearly 8M Americans have fallen into poverty since summer

#246

Post by jahaja » Thu, Dec 17, 2020, 3:59 PM UTC

xyzzyz wrote: post #244

jahaja wrote: post #239

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What would be the point of that? "Americans" is already gender neutral?

And what do you think is the “gender neutral” term that Spanish speakers use when they refer to group of people of Latin American origin? It surely is not “latinxs”. “What would be point of that?”, yes, that’s exactly the issue. It would seem weird, forced and foreign, just like “latinxs” does to people it is purported to refer to.

It seems to be a bit strange to complain about how widespread the use is of a newly coined term.

I assume that much of this "outrage" is some kind of a "culture war" thing. Instead of focusing on important stuff people get all distracted with "old man angry at minor change" and bike shed things like this ad infinitum.

> yes, that’s exactly the issue

What? it's not needed with "Americans" so there's no need. In some languages gender neutral terms can be legitimately used as a shortcut for using both after each other or similar.

Re: Nearly 8M Americans have fallen into poverty since summer

#247

Post by rayiner » Thu, Dec 17, 2020, 4:09 PM UTC

pen2l wrote: post #238

rayiner wrote: post #234

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Latino/Latina are from Spanish. The words are gendered because it’s a gendered language. When non-Spanish speakers change it to Latinx it comes across as them declaring Spanish as problematic and “fixing” someone else’s language for them. There is also a class/education issue. It’s a term originating in academia that non-college educated people have mostly never heard of. Being called by a label that you don’t recogn…

Don't entirely agree with what some of what you've said but upvoting you nevertheless as clearly you argue in good faith (and to get you out of negative score), that aside -- you say: > It’s a term originating in academia that non-college educated people have mostly never heard of. Being called by a label that you don’t recognize is alienating. Okay, so the word is an academic construct. But it comes from a good plac…

Inclusivity isn’t a single axis. When a politician calls a group of people by a label that’s unfamiliar to them and that they don’t recognize or identify with, that’s exclusionary and alienating.

Example: I’m from Bangladesh. It means “country of Bengalis.” We fought an independence war with Pakistan to have a country for our own ethnic/linguistic group. The name of the country is exclusionary of the non-Bengali ethnic and linguistic groups, including the indigenous population. If an academic wants to come up with a different label for us, they can do that. But politicians shouldn’t use it until we broadly accept the label. It’s not Elizabeth Warren’s place to take a prescriptive position on what Bangladeshis call themselves.

Stepping back, identity and how it’s defined and what it’s defined by reference to is an explosively complicated issue. Focusing on issues like gender inclusivity is a western, and particularly American, way of looking at language and identity labels. Different cultures will sort out how they want to approach these issues. It’s not something white Americans like Elizabeth Warren should just parachute into.

> Académie Française

The French can do what they want with their own language. But as an Anglophile I have to point out that they could easily solve the problem of gendering in French by just speaking English instead. That would also solve their problem of having to come up with French words for things invented by English-speakers.

Re: Nearly 8M Americans have fallen into poverty since summer

#248

Post by caeril » Thu, Dec 17, 2020, 4:30 PM UTC

bittercynic wrote: post #36

save_ferris wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The fear of "looking poor" is so real in the US, which makes it harder to see who's struggling. It also creates this cognitive dissonance I've noticed here on HN where an article gets posted with pictures of the extended lines at food banks and people point out that most people seem to be driving relatively new cars, therefore why are they in line at a food bank? I think a lot of people don't understand how poverty r…

It is very real, but if you can somehow escape from it there are huge advantages. Not caring that we might look poor has been the biggest factor enabling me and my wife to build a good, stable life for ourselves while peers who out-earn us perpetually struggle on the brink of ruin.

> but if you can somehow escape from it

Not sure what you mean by this. There's nothing to escape from. The word we have for superficial consumerist social strivers who spend conspicuously to soothe their ego and signal their status is "asshole". Don't be an asshole. It's not that hard.

Re: Nearly 8M Americans have fallen into poverty since summer

#249

Post by rayiner » Thu, Dec 17, 2020, 4:53 PM UTC

pen2l wrote: post #238

rayiner wrote: post #234

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Latino/Latina are from Spanish. The words are gendered because it’s a gendered language. When non-Spanish speakers change it to Latinx it comes across as them declaring Spanish as problematic and “fixing” someone else’s language for them. There is also a class/education issue. It’s a term originating in academia that non-college educated people have mostly never heard of. Being called by a label that you don’t recogn…

Don't entirely agree with what some of what you've said but upvoting you nevertheless as clearly you argue in good faith (and to get you out of negative score), that aside -- you say: > It’s a term originating in academia that non-college educated people have mostly never heard of. Being called by a label that you don’t recognize is alienating. Okay, so the word is an academic construct. But it comes from a good plac…

Let me address the issue from a slightly different angle. White progressives calling Latinos “Latinx” is in some respects a demand for assimilation into prevailing American ideas of gender-identity inclusivity. (I recognize that it’s not an exclusively American phenomenon, but the movement has more purchase in the United States than in say Guatemala.)

There is a long tradition of Americans saying “it’s fine if you’re Catholic or Polish so long as you believe the same things that Protestant Americans believe.” This continues to this day. Whites set the direction of the Democratic Party on social issues, and Black/Hispanic/Muslim people, who are much more conservative on social issues, follow. (Obviously there are many Black/Hispanic/Muslim people who are socially progressive. But on average they’re much more conservative: https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2020/02/27/5-facts-abo.... For example, 55% of Black Democrats say “you must believe in God to be moral.” Just 11% of white Democrats say that.)

I’m not criticizing all that, I’m just noting that it’s a power dynamic that clearly exists. However, these days, nobody wants to come out and say “it’s okay if you’re a Muslim immigrant from a country where homosexuality is illegal, but you’re in America now and you’re going to have to get cool with LGBT rights.” What happens instead is social engineering of people’s’ identities by media, academia, and political leaders. Ilhan Omar and Linda Sarsour are amplified and become the face of Islam. Movies and TV are filled with socially progressive hijabis. Progressive Muslim academics and writers are amplified and given platforms.

To use another example: fully half of Black people still do not accept same-sex marriage. Just half say abortion is morally acceptable. When was the last time a socially conservative Black person got any mainstream media airtime? Same thing with Hispanic people opposed to abortion? A Muslim who holds social views held by nearly all of the world’s billion Muslims?

I’m not objecting to the sentiment. I agree Bangladeshis who come to America should leave Bangladeshi views of homosexuality in the old country. What’s creepy to me is the mechanics of how this works. Instead of telling people, “you’re in America now and here’s what we believe” we are redefining peoples’ identities. We selectively amplify Bangladeshi voices that happen to agree with white progressives.

Re: Nearly 8M Americans have fallen into poverty since summer

#250

Post by xyzzyz » Thu, Dec 17, 2020, 5:43 PM UTC

jahaja wrote: post #246

xyzzyz wrote: post #244

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And what do you think is the “gender neutral” term that Spanish speakers use when they refer to group of people of Latin American origin? It surely is not “latinxs”. “What would be point of that?”, yes, that’s exactly the issue. It would seem weird, forced and foreign, just like “latinxs” does to people it is purported to refer to.

It seems to be a bit strange to complain about how widespread the use is of a newly coined term. I assume that much of this "outrage" is some kind of a "culture war" thing. Instead of focusing on important stuff people get all distracted with "old man angry at minor change" and bike shed things like this ad infinitum. > yes, that’s exactly the issue What? it's not needed with "Americans" so there's no need. In some l…

> What? it's not needed with "Americans" so there's no need

But that’s the point: it’s not needed in Spanish either. Spanish speakers are totally fine without new inventions like “latinx”. They see those strange American people, who usually don’t even speak Spanish, try to impose their own new norms on what the Latinos should be called, and they don’t like this kind of cultural imperialism.

The whole problem stems to a large degree from lack of understanding the English speakers have for gendered languages. English is, with few exceptions, not gendered. The exceptions are rare enough that people who care can try to lobby for using gender neutral terms, like they are used for almost everything else. This is often against established language patterns, but since English is, in general, not gendered, it doesn’t seem all that out of place.

That’s not how gendered languages works. In gendered languages, everything had a gender. In Spanish, chair is female, and desk is male. When you use an adjective, you need to use it in an appropriate gendered form to match the gender of the noun. Spanish speakers are completely used to it, and don’t see this as anything special or in need of rectification: that’s just how their language works. External efforts to make some specific words gender neutral are just strange and foreign to them.