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> the lives of the American poor were not substantially improved by the vast amounts of excess wealth and productivity that let almost everyone off the farms.

> the lives of the American poor were not substantially improved by the vast amounts of excess wealth and productivity that let almost everyone off the farms. While it's likely that the opportunity to escape poverty is lower today than in the past, objectively things are far better today for the poor than at the turn of the 20th century when the U.S. economy was transitioning away from being heavily agrarian [1]. At that time, the poor had far less leisure, food security, and sanitation. I agree with the general sentiment of your comment; I am highly skeptical of UBI and assert that its extreme expense is not practical. Likewise, countries that offer free or low-cost college don't enjoy increased enrollment by students of low-income families [2]. 1. http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2014/01/a-report-card-for-humanity-1900-2050/282928/ http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2014/01/a-r... 2. http://www.reuters.com/article/us-education-oecd-idUSKBN0H41VW20140909 http://www.reuters.com/article/us-education-oecd-idUSKBN0H41...

ThrustVectoring 10y ago
I think we have a roughly equivalent picture of what changed for the poor, just different words to describe it. The actual work necessary to keep everyone fed and clothed fell by a factor of at least twenty, while the lot of the poor improved by something like a factor of two to five. They're far better off, sure, but far below the 1:1 ratio that non-systematic analysis will often assume for anti-poverty interventions.
greysphere 10y ago
Sorry, where does article [2] show a lack of correlation between low-cost college and low-income enrollment? The only comment that seemed relevant was the following, which implied the opposite: "In addition to less educational mobility, the United States, along with Japan, Germany, Austria and Estonia, has "less equitable access" to higher education, meaning that it's harder for people with lower socioeconomic status to attend college, the OECD's Schleicher said. That contrasts with countries such as Finland, Ireland, Australia and the Netherlands, which have both more equitable access to education and higher educational mobility, he said."
- linkregister 10y ago
  Sorry, I should have been more explicit. The graduation rate for US students is 8 percent higher than Germany. The original article that talked about it was pretty opinionated so I opted for an unbiased source. However, that omitted the analysis.
  - greysphere 10y ago
    Thanks for the clarification. 5 minutes of internetting points out that that the 8 percent difference (39us, 31ger) is at 4 years while the 6 year us number is 59 and the ?8? year ger number is 77. The relationship between cost of college and low income graduates seems pretty unclear to me still. http://redalertpolitics.com/2016/01/07/america-losing-graduation-rates-higher-europe-us/ http://redalertpolitics.com/2016/01/07/america-losing-gradua... (and i make no claims to the authenticity of this source - 5 minutes of internetting...)
    - linkregister 10y ago
      I would never expect even 5 minutes of internetting to fact-check my comment :) . I guess it's not especially clear and my point is more or less invalidated.

ThrustVectoring 10y ago

I think we have a roughly equivalent picture of what changed for the poor, just different words to describe it. The actual work necessary to keep everyone fed and clothed fell by a factor of at least twenty, while the lot of the poor improved by something like a factor of two to five. They're far better off, sure, but far below the 1:1 ratio that non-systematic analysis will often assume for anti-poverty interventions.

greysphere 10y ago

Sorry, where does article [2] show a lack of correlation between low-cost college and low-income enrollment? The only comment that seemed relevant was the following, which implied the opposite: "In addition to less educational mobility, the United States, along with Japan, Germany, Austria and Estonia, has "less equitable access" to higher education, meaning that it's harder for people with lower socioeconomic status to attend college, the OECD's Schleicher said. That contrasts with countries such as Finland, Ireland, Australia and the Netherlands, which have both more equitable access to education and higher educational mobility, he said."

linkregister 10y ago
Sorry, I should have been more explicit. The graduation rate for US students is 8 percent higher than Germany. The original article that talked about it was pretty opinionated so I opted for an unbiased source. However, that omitted the analysis.
- greysphere 10y ago
  Thanks for the clarification. 5 minutes of internetting points out that that the 8 percent difference (39us, 31ger) is at 4 years while the 6 year us number is 59 and the ?8? year ger number is 77. The relationship between cost of college and low income graduates seems pretty unclear to me still. http://redalertpolitics.com/2016/01/07/america-losing-graduation-rates-higher-europe-us/ http://redalertpolitics.com/2016/01/07/america-losing-gradua... (and i make no claims to the authenticity of this source - 5 minutes of internetting...)
  - linkregister 10y ago
    I would never expect even 5 minutes of internetting to fact-check my comment :) . I guess it's not especially clear and my point is more or less invalidated.