Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

How to live on $432 a month in America

shagbark.substack.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

601–610 of 764 posts

Re: How to live on $432 a month in America

#601

Post by projektfu »

Loughla wrote: post #147
TrackerFF wrote: post #134

I looked through those numbers, and immediately thought to myself - hope you don't need to see a doctor for anything serious, or go to a dentist for that mater. FWIW, I grew up in rural nowhere (population 150, nearest town 45 miles away) - and I honestly don't know how anyone can live out in the boonies without a car. Taking the bus that goes 3 times a day is one thing, needing to move stuff is another thing. I mean…

What small town even has a bus? The closest bus line to me is in the closest large town (40k) about an hour away. Are there bus lines in the middle of nowhere?

St. Lawrence County does offer several shuttles that run only 1-4 times per day in each direction. It is probably better to add a bike or e-bike to the list.

I think when people write these articles, they should have lived the life instead of just totaling a few expenses. It is very hard to live without at least a few unforeseen expenses above the base budget. The life proposed here is like a 19th century life, waiting for the stagecoach to take you to where you can pay your property taxes, and then spending the day in town because the next stagecoach out doesn't come for hours.

Re: How to live on $432 a month in America

#602

Post by diggan »

jefftk wrote: post #363
pyuser583 wrote: post #345

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then the value of the place would go up fast. This is one way gentrification happens.

That seems to be pretty good for the group of newcomers! They all buy together at lowish prices, then prices go up enough that they ~make their money back on housing appreciation. And it's not bad for existing homeowners either, since they get the appreciation too.

> And it's not bad for existing homeowners either, since they get the appreciation too.

Assuming everyone is only out after appreciating house prices. While the locals who lived there before you might like that the house gains in value, depending on how large the group is and what the culture is, they might not like it at all. There is a reason some rural people continue living in rural areas, and bringing parts of the city to them might not be ideal for those people.

Re: How to live on $432 a month in America

#603

Post by amluto »

KennyBlanken wrote: post #334
xp84 wrote: post #270

I've commented (probably too much) to argue with the harshest critics of this piece, but I am surprised to not have seen much this criticism which is my main one: Supposing I've made peace with the main gist of this: Cut living expenses to a point where you can work ¼ or so of the time most of us spend working by living somewhere cheap and not being so materialistic. The missing piece here is social connections. Fami…

Rural living also looks cheaper because most people do not even remotely consider the costs of transportation. The IRS estimates per-mile deduction at well over 60 cents per mile. If you have to drive 15 miles to the grocery store and back, your grocery bill goes up $18/trip. If you need to drive 15 miles to work and back, take $90/week out of your paycheck. Then there's the fact that whoever is The Employer in that…

You can drive for a lot less than $0.60c/mi. At $0.04/kWh, evergy to propel an EV costs 1-2 cents per mile. If you buy a $35k car and drive it 200k miles while spending very little on maintenance (tires might be the major expense), add maybe $0.20/mi, for a total of $0.21/mi or so. Insurance isn’t all that expensive and doesn’t vary that much with mileage. If you buy a BYD car (oh wait, not in the US), it’s even cheaper.

Re: How to live on $432 a month in America

#604

Post by stackedinserter »

If you're ready to move to frozen salty belt to live bare minimum, why not move to a cheap country, work as English tutor for 10x quality of life?

Don't live in this area, it sucks. You'll have 8 months of miserable, not enjoyable winter with winds and freezing rains, 2 months if suffocating humid summer with mosquitos and ticks, and maybe relatively enjoyable September. Ask me how I know.

Re: How to live on $432 a month in America

#606

Post by projektfu »

fullstop wrote: post #599
projektfu wrote: post #562

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Rural NY isn't just for introverts. Most people are social and are somewhat active. Like most areas, an outsider will probably feel like an outsider, but if one allows themselves to be curious about the things people are into doing, I think it would be fine for typically social people. One who sneers at rural people and habits will probably not get along. And if you take too much offense at rural people sneering abou…

> Unfortunately, there is a lot of racism in upstate NY. I do know rural NY black people, and they do fine, but I'm not sure they appreciate the way insults are thrown about "present company excluded". It's those attitudes that kept me from wanting to stay. This is so heartbreaking. I live in a suburban area, and have friends and neighbors from around the world -- Trinidad, Sri Lanka, Korea, Canada, and I _love_ that…

Yeah, it will hopefully improve with more exposure. Even suburban NY was highly racist in the 80s, maybe by the 2040s with more diversity it will be better in rural NY. But one thing I noticed as a young man road tripping through the South in the 90s was that the racism was a different species from Northern racism. In Birmingham, AL, I found people relating to each other like normal people. Birmingham, where they used water cannon and dogs against marchers and blew up a church in the 60s. In rural Ohio, a black friend of mine walked into a breakfast restaurant with me and had dozens of pairs of eyes staring at him like he had just announced he's robbing the place. It wasn't until I learned the history of sundown towns that I understood the racism of the North and its place in Segregated America.

Re: How to live on $432 a month in America

#607

Post by oneshotpez »

testing22321 wrote: post #570
probably_wrong wrote: post #168

I think the author is arguing against their own point with the illustration they chose. The very last picture can be found in the Wikipedia page for the Homestead Act and, two jumps later, one can find themselves in the Dutch version of "Sod house" [1] which has this to say: > The living conditions there were miserable. Due to the construction method, the room was difficult to heat, it was damp and teeming with vermi…

I lived in a place purely heated by a wood stove in the Yukon. It was glorious, easily best heat and nicest feel ever. When it was past -40 I’d get up at 1am to put in more wood, otherwise I’d have to spend 30 minutes in the morning lighting it again. Places heated with wood stoves are NOT damp or miserable. I loved it. Working on doing it again.

Wow tending a fire 24/7 so I don’t die. Living the life, yo.

Re: How to live on $432 a month in America

#608

Post by Barrin92 »

dsalzman wrote: post #532

Surprised that there isn’t a kibbutz trend in the US with this sentiment.

A lot of kibbutzim are run collectively. As a joke in the TV show The Americans went, from an Israeli to a Soviet spy: "if you like socialism so much, defect to Israel, we do it better".

That kind of thing isn't in the American DNA. You'd have people demand a lawn and a fence after a month.

Re: How to live on $432 a month in America

#609

Post by fullstop »

projektfu wrote: post #606
fullstop wrote: post #599

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Unfortunately, there is a lot of racism in upstate NY. I do know rural NY black people, and they do fine, but I'm not sure they appreciate the way insults are thrown about "present company excluded". It's those attitudes that kept me from wanting to stay. This is so heartbreaking. I live in a suburban area, and have friends and neighbors from around the world -- Trinidad, Sri Lanka, Korea, Canada, and I _love_ that…

Yeah, it will hopefully improve with more exposure. Even suburban NY was highly racist in the 80s, maybe by the 2040s with more diversity it will be better in rural NY. But one thing I noticed as a young man road tripping through the South in the 90s was that the racism was a different species from Northern racism. In Birmingham, AL, I found people relating to each other like normal people. Birmingham, where they use…

With the direction things seem to be going, I'm not as confident about your 2040 hopes.

On a return trip from Florida we booked a room in Florence, SC for the night. Everybody was staring at me, but I was exhausted and figured that it was just in my head. We ate breakfast there the next morning and that's when I realized that we were the only white people there. About 50% of the population of Florence is black.

It was an interesting experience, and it gave me the opportunity to understand a fraction of how it would feel if the roles were reversed. And this was with friendly people with no malicious intent or fear!

Re: How to live on $432 a month in America

#610

Post by kixiQu »

I think we should all just calibrate what kind of project we believe the author to be engaged in from the following quote from a linked post:

> After all, constant sunshine is the weather of the dullard. The lover of hot, lazy days and breezy, cloudless skies fancies himself a lordling — he insists that the earth be his womb-like chamber of easy, saccharine delights. He is the same man who enjoys sugary-sweet sodas, on-the-nose political commentary, prefers his novels to be cheap and gutless, and his women botoxed and spray-tanned.

No very close reading is required, I believe.

Post reply on HN