6 ms·
Learning costs money, especially as an adult. You still need to cover your basic expenses, homeless or not.
by ionised 8y ago
Learning costs money, especially as an adult.
You still need to cover your basic expenses, homeless or not.
- bko 8y agoLearning is not just formal education. Learning costs much less money today than it probably ever has. Practically everyone in the US has the access of all the world's collective information.
- iei02ndjd 8y agoAnd all the free time in the world while working 3 jobs: https://youtu.be/wFNj5sireDo https://youtu.be/wFNj5sireDo
- bko 8y agoOP originally said it was expensive. She did not argue that it was easy or the person had free time. That's a cute clip, but if you look at statistics you'll see Americans with less than a high school degree work on average 7.8 hours a day, and only 30% work on weekends and holidays. https://www.bls.gov/news.release/atus.t04.htm https://www.bls.gov/news.release/atus.t04.htm
- iei02ndjd 8y agoStatistics hide the raw numbers and emotional reality. 30% is how many people? What’s their schedule look like if they have kids too? That’s a cute trick, using cold hard facts to normalize away bullshit
- bko 8y agoProvide something to back up the claim that less educated Americans are working 3 jobs and that it's impossible for them to receive education. The evidence I provided to support my claim is not perfect but it's better than a video of bush making a joke
- shaftoe 8y agoYou don't get ahead by making excuses and you don't help people by defending straw men.
- flatb 8y agoYou also don't get ahead if you there's a perfectly valid reason outside of your control that prevents you from 'getting ahead', or makes it extremely unlikely. Most dictionaries would call those 'excuses'. And you especially don't get ahead if those valid reasons exist but are seldom discussed by the people with the most power to solve them, and are instead often reduced to 'excuses', 'lazyness', or any other straw man, like the one you're complaining about.
- lyzan 8y agoWhile not totally free (access costs) a vast majority of the knowlage I've learned and use for my job has been from free resources online. Realistically, I've probably spent under $500 in 10 years on educational materials (excluding buying my first non-work-sponsored laptop) and am now "Senior" level in my field. Plus almost all that was in more recent years as I'm trying learn more theoretical / academic applications. Combine that with most cities having libraries with free books and in major cities free internet, and I'd argue is cheaper and easier than ever to learn, though it does still cost time.
- SolaceQuantum 8y agoHow much of that could you do pulling multiple low-wage jobs and raising child(ren)? If you yourself had a serious chronic illness? If you yourself was raised in poverty so you had to go to schools with high failure rates and no education in which to acquire your own education?
- lyzan 8y agoOh, don't get me wrong: I don't think its the best option, but the scenario first described in question was a homeless man with indefinite "free" time on their hands. I personally work 2 full time jobs, I'm aware how scarce free time can get. I'm certainly not saying that everyone can do it on their own either. Just that cost is a very weak barrier to knowledge and that I agree you need to learn your way out of poverty. I'm also a big proponent of basic income exactly for the reasons above, but I think the core idea is well founded. Hard work at a job (or two jobs) doesn't usually get you out of a shitty job, where as learning enough to get a better job does.
- presscast 8y agoTime is money, as the saying goes. When you're working a double shift to put food on the table, it's really hard to learn an extra skill set (e.g. programming) and make time to build up a resume on github (or whatever). The cost isn't really located in the act of "buying" education.
- 8y ago
- xvire 8y agoLearning costs is only marginally higher than the cost of idleness.
- sharemywin 8y agoyou assume poor people are idle.
- kamaal 8y agoI don't think any one is saying its easy. People are only saying access to resources and the overall process has only gotten easier. A person still has to work an uphill run everyday until they reach some financial break through .
- xvire 8y agoI don't assume anything. I just point out, that cost of self-education is indeed huge, if you measure it in profits not received from performing some labor. However, its 'price' would still be on par with being completely idle. Of course, not all poor people are idle, but some are. And if those who are indeed idle can afford idleness, non-idle people may afford self-learning.
- dgudkov 8y agoWhat's the cost of self-education of a person that doesn't much anyway? Sitting on a bench all day is not labor, it's a waste of time.