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I've never been able to articulate my own feeling about wealth and poverty. I've been objectively poor at some points in my life. I became vegetarian in my ea

I've never been able to articulate my own feeling about wealth and poverty. I've been objectively poor at some points in my life. I became vegetarian in my early 20s when I was travelling because I couldn't afford meat. Even then there were some weeks where I didn't eat for a few days because I had spent all my money for the week. It sounds bad, but being hungry taught me how to prioritise and I don't regret it. In other times of my life, I have quit my job and spent half a year writing free software, or training karate -- without any income. I also spent 5 years living in a run down shack spending less than $10K a year, when I was teaching English in Japan. By many measures, I was living in poverty because I had almost no income, or I was spending almost no money. But at no time in my life have I ever thought of myself as poor. I have always had money in the bank and I have never really been in debt. When I went hungry it was because I stupidly spent my food budget on beer (or something similar). I didn't have money for food, but I did have money. Money is an option to buy things and for me the feeling of being rich is the feeling of always having that option. You can be happy with less things, I think. Nobody actually needs a yacht to be happy, or a big house, or a collection of vintage wine. But I think it is really hard to be happy when you have no options. It is even harder to be happy when you spend your options in the future and have to suffer with crushing debt -- possibly enslaved forever. I could choose to be hungry. I could choose to give up my job and do something that paid no money. I could choose to move half way around the world and live in a shack teaching English. That's incredible wealth for me. That kind of wealth is available to many people, but I think that most people can't see it, unfortunately.

startDaemons 11y ago
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jethro_tell 11y ago
It would be fair to say that you have some technical skill not afforded to the truly poor. Most English teaching positions in Japan require a college education, which is the epitome of this study carried to an extreme. Anyone can learn to code or do Linux ops work, a skill that you have that keeps true poverty at bay. Most can go to school on grants if they are truly poor but there's a learning curve to being able to fill the paperwork out, a time and transportation cost to getting the paperwork done and to the right place. In these situations, you have chosen to live as poor, but the opportunity to not be poor is always there because you had an education, you had a skill, and those things gave you an opportunity to save up enough to work for free for a while. There are a lot of places in the world where people don't even know you could work on computers for a very high wage. And even when they do, they lack the know-how to find a geographically diverse community that can mentor them.
- caf 11y ago
  This is worth pointing out - education is human capital, an intangible form of wealth.
  - jethro_tell 11y ago
    That was bought with tangible wealth and the mildly less tangible opportunity cost of having the time to do that instead of work.
    - logical42 11y ago
      Having actual tangible wealth is not necessary. One can opt to join the army and fund college via the GI Bill, for instance. And generally, opportunity cost tends not to be super high when you don't have skills or an education.
  - oxide 11y ago
    thanks for sharing that nugget of wisdom, I don't think I've ever heard a perspective on education that was more inspiring. I'm going to stop making excuses and go back to school, I think.
    - logical42 11y ago
      I almost don't want to say this because I'd hate to discourage anyone from going back to school, but school isn't necessary or sufficient for having or gaining an education. Nowadays especially.
      - jethro_tell 11y ago
        Did you go to college? I tend to hear this most from people who went to college. I didn't, and I definitely have trouble getting my resume in front of Hiring managers because I get screened out in the linked in search. You can make it work but it's not easy and you'll get paid less then your peers for a long time. Less than the debt they acquired? not sure.
lxe 11y ago
You are "quit writing software and went to Japan" poor. There is also the "working 2 jobs to feed 3 kids" sort of poor. These are completely different kinds of "poor".
- protomyth 11y ago
  Rural or urban also makes a difference. My brother and I regard fish as "poor people's food", a thought brought on by experiences as youths. I should point out many poor people on EBT (new name for food stamps) do buy toilet paper in bulk once a month. I do wonder how many merchants raise some prices on the 1st of the month.
  - AndrewUnmuted 11y ago
    This is exactly one of the problems with EBT. Knowing that all the state benefit income is fast approaching, businesses do everything they can to ensure they sell as much cheap Chinese-made goods, horribly unhealthy food products, and (cold) sandwiches (never hot, that's not something EBT covers) as they can. Every month this causes huge boom-bust cycles in neighborhoods and local businesses, which adds to the perpetual trauma state benefits have wreaked upon the disenfranchised poor that live in the US's major cities. But Coca-Cola, Nestle, Walmart and Kroger all get their predictable windfalls as a result. And people wonder why these companies are the primary supporters of EBT! It's because EBT is not a people subsidy, but rather a massive corporate subsidy that is also trapping our most vulnerable citizens into food desert wastelands. As "well intended" as these programs are, they are worse than doing nothing at all, as far as I can tell. I don't see how such massive and ruthless commodification of the poor could ever be achieved in private industry without government support and regulation to bolster it.
    - protomyth 11y ago
      What exactly do you suggest to fix the problem with EBT?
      - AndrewUnmuted 11y ago
PhasmaFelis 11y ago
> That kind of wealth is available to many people, but I think that most people can't see it, unfortunately. I don't much like beer. Something about the taste, maybe the hops, I dunno. Every time I tell someone I don't like beer, they say "Oh, you just haven't had _good_ beer! You should try this one!" And I try it, and I don't like it. Some folks can acquire a taste for beer, given enough exposure. I've given it plenty of exposure, and it just doesn't work for me. I suspect that the ability to "see" the kind of wealth you're talking about, to be happy and fulfilled on a razor-edge budget, is like a taste for beer. Some people have it built-in, some people can acquire it, some people will never have it; they just aren't wired that way. It's really cool that you were able to be happy under those circumstances. But it's dangerous to assume (with just about anything) that everyone else could learn to be like you, if they only wanted it enough.
- jethro_tell 11y ago
  The kind of wealth that doesn't have dependants
  - PhasmaFelis 11y ago
    That, too. Good luck getting a hungry child to "see the wealth" in not eating for "a few days."
    - jethro_tell 11y ago
      Ha *few hours FTFY
ap22213 11y ago
What's your life story before 20? I think those are critical development years.
matthewowen 11y ago
At those times, you were poor in the same way that a person who goes on a camping trip experiences being homeless for a weekend. If you have the skills/connections/etc to be able to trivially leave poverty when you need to then you are never truly living in poverty. You lack the vulnerability. Your story is nice, but it has nothing to do with poverty.

startDaemons 11y ago

Hello, I created an account to let you know how much I enjoyed your comment!

jethro_tell 11y ago

It would be fair to say that you have some technical skill not afforded to the truly poor. Most English teaching positions in Japan require a college education, which is the epitome of this study carried to an extreme. Anyone can learn to code or do Linux ops work, a skill that you have that keeps true poverty at bay. Most can go to school on grants if they are truly poor but there's a learning curve to being able to fill the paperwork out, a time and transportation cost to getting the paperwork done and to the right place. In these situations, you have chosen to live as poor, but the opportunity to not be poor is always there because you had an education, you had a skill, and those things gave you an opportunity to save up enough to work for free for a while. There are a lot of places in the world where people don't even know you could work on computers for a very high wage. And even when they do, they lack the know-how to find a geographically diverse community that can mentor them.

caf 11y ago
This is worth pointing out - education is human capital, an intangible form of wealth.
- jethro_tell 11y ago
  That was bought with tangible wealth and the mildly less tangible opportunity cost of having the time to do that instead of work.
  - logical42 11y ago
    Having actual tangible wealth is not necessary. One can opt to join the army and fund college via the GI Bill, for instance. And generally, opportunity cost tends not to be super high when you don't have skills or an education.
- oxide 11y ago
  thanks for sharing that nugget of wisdom, I don't think I've ever heard a perspective on education that was more inspiring. I'm going to stop making excuses and go back to school, I think.
  - logical42 11y ago
    I almost don't want to say this because I'd hate to discourage anyone from going back to school, but school isn't necessary or sufficient for having or gaining an education. Nowadays especially.
    - jethro_tell 11y ago
      Did you go to college? I tend to hear this most from people who went to college. I didn't, and I definitely have trouble getting my resume in front of Hiring managers because I get screened out in the linked in search. You can make it work but it's not easy and you'll get paid less then your peers for a long time. Less than the debt they acquired? not sure.

lxe 11y ago

You are "quit writing software and went to Japan" poor. There is also the "working 2 jobs to feed 3 kids" sort of poor. These are completely different kinds of "poor".

protomyth 11y ago
Rural or urban also makes a difference. My brother and I regard fish as "poor people's food", a thought brought on by experiences as youths. I should point out many poor people on EBT (new name for food stamps) do buy toilet paper in bulk once a month. I do wonder how many merchants raise some prices on the 1st of the month.
- AndrewUnmuted 11y ago
  This is exactly one of the problems with EBT. Knowing that all the state benefit income is fast approaching, businesses do everything they can to ensure they sell as much cheap Chinese-made goods, horribly unhealthy food products, and (cold) sandwiches (never hot, that's not something EBT covers) as they can. Every month this causes huge boom-bust cycles in neighborhoods and local businesses, which adds to the perpetual trauma state benefits have wreaked upon the disenfranchised poor that live in the US's major cities. But Coca-Cola, Nestle, Walmart and Kroger all get their predictable windfalls as a result. And people wonder why these companies are the primary supporters of EBT! It's because EBT is not a people subsidy, but rather a massive corporate subsidy that is also trapping our most vulnerable citizens into food desert wastelands. As "well intended" as these programs are, they are worse than doing nothing at all, as far as I can tell. I don't see how such massive and ruthless commodification of the poor could ever be achieved in private industry without government support and regulation to bolster it.
  - protomyth 11y ago
    What exactly do you suggest to fix the problem with EBT?
    - AndrewUnmuted 11y ago

PhasmaFelis 11y ago

> That kind of wealth is available to many people, but I think that most people can't see it, unfortunately. I don't much like beer. Something about the taste, maybe the hops, I dunno. Every time I tell someone I don't like beer, they say "Oh, you just haven't had _good_ beer! You should try this one!" And I try it, and I don't like it. Some folks can acquire a taste for beer, given enough exposure. I've given it plenty of exposure, and it just doesn't work for me. I suspect that the ability to "see" the kind of wealth you're talking about, to be happy and fulfilled on a razor-edge budget, is like a taste for beer. Some people have it built-in, some people can acquire it, some people will never have it; they just aren't wired that way. It's really cool that you were able to be happy under those circumstances. But it's dangerous to assume (with just about anything) that everyone else could learn to be like you, if they only wanted it enough.

jethro_tell 11y ago
The kind of wealth that doesn't have dependants
- PhasmaFelis 11y ago
  That, too. Good luck getting a hungry child to "see the wealth" in not eating for "a few days."
  - jethro_tell 11y ago
    Ha *few hours FTFY

ap22213 11y ago

What's your life story before 20? I think those are critical development years.

matthewowen 11y ago

At those times, you were poor in the same way that a person who goes on a camping trip experiences being homeless for a weekend. If you have the skills/connections/etc to be able to trivially leave poverty when you need to then you are never truly living in poverty. You lack the vulnerability. Your story is nice, but it has nothing to do with poverty.