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On the Experience of Being Poor-Ish, for People Who Aren't

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Re: On the Experience of Being Poor-Ish, for People Who Aren't

#521

Post by criticaljudge »

danaris wrote: post #426
dalbasal wrote: post #303

His point on housing is so important, and its adjacent to a lot of other poverty-related issues. It's one of the reasons advocates for the poor often seem to speak a different language to their opposition. If you live in median-and-above-land, you think of all costs existing on a spectrum. Fancy dinners for $100 on one end. Rice and beans for pennies at the other. This is true for clothes, smartphones, furniture... l…

> Ireland has/had a whole literary genre of stories about miserable poverty-stricken childhoods. They paint a very vivid picture. If you compare it to poverty today, besides being less harsh, it's quite different. They had housing. It was basic, often insecure, but they did have housing. > Food was scarce. That's no longer the case. Stuff though... they had no stuff. No bed, no mugs, no shoes, no pencils. Getting the…

Well arguably they are not really poor, compared to those cases of poverty in the 19th century.

Re: On the Experience of Being Poor-Ish, for People Who Aren't

#522

Post by pmiller2 »

TrackerFF wrote: post #374

I think the biggest threat to poor people, would be the ridiculous housing market. It's not just in big expensive cities, it's pretty much everywhere. Only places that are being spared, are those in destitute areas with some serious emigration problems - but those things happen for a reason (no work). In my country (Norway), the housing market has appreciated around 5.5% ANNUALLY, compared to annual wage increase of…

You are absolutely right.

I live in the Bay Area now, which everyone knows has absurd rental prices. In my home town, I can rent a comparable sized apartment to what I have now for around 1/3 what I currently pay. But, there's no way I could earn 1/3 the income I make as a Bay Area software engineer working at a non-remote job in my home town.

Even making 1/4 what I'm making would be highly optimistic. I just did a search on Google for "$HOMETOWN $HOME_STATE jobs," and pretty much everything I could qualify for was retail level jobs. In my home town, that means probably $10/hour, or, $20k/year, if you can manage to get full time hours. Even in retail management, it would be tough to hit 1/5 of what I make now. Add in student loans, which are a fixed expense, no matter where I go, unless I want to go to a repayment plan that depends on my income and never pay them off, and we see the advantage goes squarely to the Bay Area.

Now, imagine starting in my home town and actually making it to the Bay Area. If you move with a job already lined up, you'll need to have at least 1 month's rent + 1 month security deposit saved up, plus moving expenses. First month's rent and security deposit will be at least $3500. Think about how long it takes to save up $3500 making $20k per year. Then, think about how this doesn't include moving expenses, which, even if everything you own fits in your personal vehicle, is going to amount to another several hundred for gas and probably at least one night in a hotel if you drive. Call it another $500.

Oh, and I forgot to mention, at $20k per year in my home town, you're probably either spending 35-40% of your gross income on rent, or living with roommates. So, good luck saving up nearly 1/4 of your gross annual income just to GTFO.

Re: On the Experience of Being Poor-Ish, for People Who Aren't

#523

Post by ryandrake »

bradleyjg wrote: post #416
nerdponx wrote: post #307

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is very much the trend I saw over the 2000s-2010s. Most of the people in my personal cohort - with university degrees and good careers - have no problem living a good life in the US. But with the rapid inflation of the cost of healthcare, higher education and housing, I wonder how that lifestyle can possibly become accessible to people who weren't essentially born into it. I know many people who were born into a…

> Something fucky is going on, and I doubt it's all because of the "free" market. At first the suburban house as bottomless bank account was a result of “natural” forces like the baby boom and white flight. But people came to assume it, and then demand it. Politicians have obliged since homeowners are an extremely large and powerful demographic. Prior to 2008 we at least pretended to have a private mortgage industry.…

After the 2008 crash, it became politically impossible to let house prices drop, so the government will basically do anything to prop them up. Too many elderly voters who depend on their home equity to fund their lifestyles. I think we'll look back at 2020 as the moment the same political pressure happened to stock market prices.

Re: On the Experience of Being Poor-Ish, for People Who Aren't

#524

Post by technofiend »

PragmaticPulp wrote: post #362
technofiend wrote: post #338

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Go read The Millionaire Next Door. You'll see that there are plenty of people like yourself who remain frugal after managing to pull themselves out of poverty. I'm suggesting the book to both validate your behavior but also give you some examples so you can perhaps moderate it if you still feel that's needed. I can give a single example from my life: my uncle managed to snag a liquor distributorship after WW II. It w…

It’s a good book, but the core point is more about how our perception of rich versus poor is detached from the reality of one’s actual wealth. It’s not uncommon for families with multi-generational wealth to also live frugal lifestyles. It’s also not unheard of for those who grew up poor to overspend their wealth at the first signs of success, because they’ve never known how to manage money at that scale. It’s import…

>It’s also not unheard of for those who grew up poor to overspend their wealth at the first signs of success, because they’ve never known how to manage money at that scale.

That was really my point: it's ok to not go buy a condo in Aspen the second you can afford it. The original poster was saying he knows he's being overly frugal. OK, fine. My counter-example of TMND was don't feel you need to move to a flashy conspicuous consumption lifestyle either.

Re: On the Experience of Being Poor-Ish, for People Who Aren't

#525

Post by pmiller2 »

huevosabio wrote: post #388
TrackerFF wrote: post #374

I think the biggest threat to poor people, would be the ridiculous housing market. It's not just in big expensive cities, it's pretty much everywhere. Only places that are being spared, are those in destitute areas with some serious emigration problems - but those things happen for a reason (no work). In my country (Norway), the housing market has appreciated around 5.5% ANNUALLY, compared to annual wage increase of…

You can't have an eternally appreciating housing market and affordable housing [0], one has to give. Our current housing market appreciation comes from systematic housing shortage. Rognlie finds out that the increase in return to capital (vs return to labor) observed by Piketty comes largely from the residential real estate sector [1]. It turns out, Henry George was right. We need to tax the value of land such that w…

There is no "systematic housing shortage." There are 59 vacant housing units for every homeless person in the US. [0] Even California has more than 9 empty housing units per homeless person. [ibid]

---

[0]: https://www.self.inc/info/empty-homes/

Re: On the Experience of Being Poor-Ish, for People Who Aren't

#526

Post by criticaljudge »

Lambdanaut wrote: post #192
marcusverus wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I’m not quite sure why it works this way. It works this way because people are, rationally, more interested in their own physical safety than they are in the feelings of strangers. Anecdote: I was in San Francisco a few years back. There were homeless folks everywhere. Some were nice, even chatty. We felt at ease even when walking through areas that were full of homeless folks. But a couple of days into our trip, a…

"Rationally"? You mentioned you had all sorts of nice experiences with homeless people and then one bad actor caused you to choose out of all of the attributes of this person, their lack of a home, to be the one for you to blanket-label all people like this as dangerous enough to place them outside of your treat-like-a-human-being sphere. Nah, there is not a rational way to blanket label groups like this from a sampl…

You can't deny that in terms of Bayesian probability, the odds are higher for a homeless person to be mentally unhinged than for the average person. Simply because mental illness is often the cause for homelessness.

Re: On the Experience of Being Poor-Ish, for People Who Aren't

#527

Post by throwaway0a5e »

nostromo wrote: post #443
LocalH wrote: post #331

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Equity should operate just as much, if not more so, by boosting people up than by cutting people down. It should also favor the individual and small business over large megacorporations. I fear that the concept of equity presents a real possibility of a race to the bottom if we're not careful to prevent a Harrison Bergeron situation. That doesn't mean I think we should avoid equity, just that we should be cognizant o…

Your fear is well-founded, that's already what is happening. Boston Public Schools, for example, just suspended placements in AP courses for all students out of equity concerns. It turns out it's much easier to achieve equity by pushing people down (no more AP courses for anyone) than by lifting people up (getting more black and latino students into AP courses).

>just suspended placements in AP courses for all students out of equity concerns.

The "ruling" class were angry that the plumbers' kids weren't paying a full 4yr of dues to the state colleges so now they're making it so you need to go to private school if you want to get a head start at college gen-eds. And they sold the idea to the masses in the name of making all the animals equal.

I'm being cynical. More likely the people responsible just don't know or care and pushing everybody down is just the easiest way to appease the pro-equity crowd.

Re: On the Experience of Being Poor-Ish, for People Who Aren't

#528

Post by dv_dt »

criticaljudge wrote: post #512
whimsicalism wrote: post #469

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The government can not and should not lift people out of poverty if those people refuse to work to better themselves. I think everyone is deserving of not living in poverty. Even "lazy" people.

I think people quickly tire of it when they have to take care of those lazy people directly. I'm not saying nothing should be done. Just that it is a fallacy to think the government simply has infinite money to spend.

I am confused by this. The comment is against taking care of lazy people directly, but also hits on government spending which would be the way to make direct personal care of lazy people indirect. As to the infinite money - we have more than enough productive capacity to supply basics of life to everyone without trying to somehow further weigh if their laziness needs to be punitively motivated for basic living support.

Is this some fear that if we provide basic supports for everyone that "too many" people would not move beyond basics? That really seems unlikely.

Re: On the Experience of Being Poor-Ish, for People Who Aren't

#529

Post by vmception »

JamesBarney wrote: post #470
bsanr2 wrote: post #428

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The liberal approach is to subsidize to maintain that base level, because of an awareness that the social outcomes tend to pay dividends in higher social unity, better health, etc. Some people would rather pay for private security than for policy that makes muggings less likely, I suppose.

Is this what California, San Francisco, or New York do?

,

.... yesn't???

Re: On the Experience of Being Poor-Ish, for People Who Aren't

#530

Post by Jotra7 »

criticaljudge wrote: post #521
danaris wrote: post #426

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Ireland has/had a whole literary genre of stories about miserable poverty-stricken childhoods. They paint a very vivid picture. If you compare it to poverty today, besides being less harsh, it's quite different. They had housing. It was basic, often insecure, but they did have housing. > Food was scarce. That's no longer the case. Stuff though... they had no stuff. No bed, no mugs, no shoes, no pencils. Getting the…

Well arguably they are not really poor, compared to those cases of poverty in the 19th century.

Really? And just how useful is that comparison? Compassion, maybe you should try it some time.
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