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Almost half of US families can't afford basics like rent and food
- algaeontoast 7y agoIn many of these cases it seems like having kids may have been an ill-advised life choice. Having kids is always a choice not a right.
- burntoutcase 7y agoIf you don't want poor people to have kids, then conservatives need to get off their high horse and accept that they must help make reliable fertility control cheap and accessible. No matter what you believe, think, or say: poor people are going to fuck whether they're married to each other or not, because being poor doesn't stop people from getting horny and lonely. Incidentally, the whole point of organizations like Planned Parenthood is to ensure that having kids is indeed a choice. Refusing to fund it because they sometimes provide abortions is inhumane and counterproductive.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- sorryforthethro 7y ago[Deleted]
- behringer 7y ago> Sorry but it's weird the core of your political argument is tied around funding a private NGO. Not OP but I'm all for the government helping people learn about and schedule abortions.
- vernie 7y agoDo the downvotes cause you pain? Just leave your original comment.
- sorryforthethro 7y agoYes they do. I don't know why but I really should just stop using these forums.
- vernie 7y agoOuch! Who's downvoting me? Stop it!
- dsr_ 7y agoIt's very clear that the Republican Party is not supportive of funding a sexual healthcare provider unless it only teaches abstinence. I'm glad you're in favor of artifical wombs, but until that happens, please note that the live ones are attached to people who deserve the same degree of bodily autonomy you have. Simplest possible case: there is no situation in which the current law will force you to donate your organs in order to save someone else's life. Even if you're already dead, you get to control your body through a pre-registration, an affirmative choice. The anti-abortion laws require women to potentially sacrifice their lives to save others.
- sorryforthethro 7y agoI wrote that I am against the current legal retaliations for exactly the reason you describe.
- vernie 7y agoIn response to your original comment, I believe there's also a desire to punish people for having premarital sex, as evidenced by right-wingers' strong opposition to emergency contraceptives.
- happytoexplain 7y agoI've never had a conversation with a person who was broadly anti-abortion and anti-subsidized-birth-control that didn't end with the explicit impression that they feel disgust for people who have sex before marriage or for reasons other than reproduction, and that the primary notion upsetting them is the idea of their taxes going toward those people in any form. It's clearly a notion born out of the popular and too-eagerly-applied idea of "bad" people who "deserve" consequences.
- tastygreenapple 7y agoWhy are people entitled to consequence free sex? We may as well fund single payer prostitution.
- anarchy8 7y agoWhat kind of deranged argument is that?
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- tastygreenapple 7y agoIt seems like the natural next-step of the blithering "you have a right to pleasure". "You have the right to healthcare" == single payer healthcare "you have the right to pleasure" == single payer prostitution
- solean 7y agowhat are condoms?
- psynautic 7y agonot free like they should be.
- mach5 7y agoso only the rich should reproduce? absolutely disgusting mindset. nobody chooses a life of poverty, and the overwhelming inequality of our current society both perpetuates and exacerbates it.
- CuriouslyC 7y agoIf you can't care for your child, you shouldn't have one. The natural order is that children from unfit parents die. There are too many humans on this planet as it is. If you're impoverished in your thirties, it is probably the result of a long history of poor life choices. You can get dealt a horrible hand with lots of tragedy and disadvantages and still be able to make it on your own in your thirties, as long as you're moderately intelligent and hardworking.
- dsfyu404ed 7y agoDefine "care" I assure you kids can and do grow up just fine without an upper middle class amount of resources thrown at them. I agree with your second paragraph though.
- ryanmercer 7y ago>Define "care" If you can't put a roof over their head, and feed them, you probably shouldn't have had them. Multiple people I went to high school with have children they outright can not afford, they couldn't afford the first, or the second, one has 5 children and has been receiving government assistance (and regular handouts as food distribution from her Church) since the first was born. This sort of thing is not uncommon, people with 1 or more children that they have never been able to afford on their own. Look, I like sex but the primary function of sex is reproduction, if you can't afford the gamble that even 1 in 100,000 times you have sex a child will result then you simply shouldn't be having sex and if you have one unplanned child, and can't afford it, you absolutely should not be doing anything that could create more until a time that have improved your means and can afford to have more. That's not eugenics, that's not mean, that's not classism, that's not racism, that's common sense. When couples want to adopt, they are almost always (if not always) required to meet with someone that they have to provide financial statements/pay stubs/w2s etc to as to show that they are able to adequately provide for a child, no one has a problem with this... Edit: and for those downvoting this, that appear to think I "am the rich" I make 34k USD per year, my father died 12 days before my 13th birthday and my mother did her best to provide for us after that, I personally have a bankruptcy from trying to live foolishly above my means in my early 20's. I drive a used car. I eat black beans and rice 5 days a week for more than half of my kcal requirements so that I CAN afford luxuries like internet, a current gen phone with a data plan, a playstation plus subscription and my two gym memberships as a strength athlete. I do not have children, if I had a sexual partner I would exercise all caution as to not have children as I know it would be a financial burden that would tax my income. I am not elitist, I am not rich, I am lower middle class. I AM responsible, I DO exercise common sense, I DO put thought into my actions that may impact me financially. Not all people living in poverty are responsible for being there, in fact most probably aren't, however many do directly worsen their situation considerably by taking up vices like alcohol & tobacco and by making financially reckless decisions like having children. These actions make it far harder to dig themselves out of poverty and they should be expected to take responsibility for their own actions instead of expecting those with more means to swoop in and rescue them from their poor choices. The grocery figure in the original article is insane, simply switching to beans and rice for half of their kcals (which will also meet healthy fiber and protein levels) would shave hundreds off that. Adding potatoes, canned vegetables, no-frills whole grain bread, would also bring down costs and probably markedly improve overall nutrition. Instead, a good chunk of these families, are likely buying overly processed box foods/soda/junk food/fast food for way too large of a portion of their dietary intake. Again, this is a poor choice many of those families are making. I've yet to find a grocery store that doesn't have shelves laden with beans, rice, lentils, potatoes and bread.
- bachmeier 7y ago1. Human beings will always make bad choices. There is nothing wrong with helping them when they do. 2. You can't blame children for mistakes made by their parents.
- leetcrew 7y agoregarding 1), there is something wrong with helping people when they make poor choices, especially when "helping" is providing material assistance. you are basically subsidizing the unwanted behavior. at the margins, this causes more people to make the bad choice in the first place. this doesn't mean the government shouldn't help people who make mistakes at all, but it does mean the help has to be structured very carefully to minimize the perverse incentives.
- hnaccy 7y ago>Human beings will always make bad choices. There is nothing wrong with helping them when they do. You're forcing others to help them by threat of force.
- wedn3sday 7y agoForcing the wealthy to help the poor is how we avoid a surge in the guillotine construction industry. Governments use the threat of force all the time to make people perform pro-social actions, if I park in a handicap zone I get a ticket. What is that ticket besides the threat of force if I dont pay it? What is any contract between any two parties besides a threat of force? On a fundamental level the government exists to threaten force against rich people in order to help poor people, which allows those poor people to go on living and not take up arms to take what they need from the wealthy.
- cliffy 7y agoThis is a really bizarre position. If reproduction is not a right, then you shouldn't have a problem with the government coming to sterilize you for some arbitrary reason, right? Maybe your skin is not the 'right' color?
- algaeontoast 7y agoI don't. I actually support recent calls for developing a means to give vasectomies (high percentage of which are reversible) to all newborn males. Therefore, having a child is the choice of both the male and female counterparts of a couple. I'd be stunned if more women didn't support this measure...
- wedn3sday 7y agoIn many places in the US having kids is actually not a choice but an obligation forced on women by lack of funding for reproductive service clinics by ignorant politicians and repeated attacks on the right to an abortion by right wing extremists. This is a very loaded conversation at the moment, but there are politicians who've said things like, if a woman is raped and becomes pregnant she should accept the gift that god gave her. The ability to have kids or not is one thing, the right to make the choice is another, and it's constantly being attacked by religious extremists.
- taborj 7y ago> This is a very loaded conversation at the moment And your choice of words to describe the situation certainly aren't helping. In fact, they're causing more harm than good, as you present one side as good and kind, and the other side as evil incarnate. In other words, this is a complex situation, and you're part of the problem.
- wedn3sday 7y agoThat might be because one side is good and kind, and the other is evil. Sure, there's two sides of every argument, but we can sit here all day an no matter what you tell me the sky will still be blue. The comment I responded to was saying, "having kids is a choice," to which I say, "many people are being forced to have kids they dont want." Forcing unwanted births is a specific policy objective pursued by a group of people pushing they're religious views on others.
- dang 7y ago> you're part of the problem A personal attack like this makes a hellish thread worse still. We ban accounts that post like that. Would you mind reviewing the site guidelines and following them? https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
- hnaccy 7y agoIf you can't afford condoms don't have sex. 23% of those 18-30 aren't having sex and they're not dying. https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2019/03/29/share-americans-not-having-sex-has-reached-record-high https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2019/03/29/share-ame...
- dang 7y agoPlease don't take HN threads further into flamewar. You created a doozy here. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
- fuzz4lyfe 7y agoIf "Nearly 51 million households don't earn enough to afford a monthly budget that includes housing, food, child care, health care, transportation and a cell phone" Is true does that mean those households do without those things? Or are they subsidized via other methods? Medicare/medicaid for health insurance for example. Such programs often have income maximums that households may be attempting to optimise for. We often hear about millions not making a living wage but the fact that we don't have millions of corpses makes that claim less effective as it exposes it as rhetoric. Or perhaps millions are dying from exposure and malnutrition as is claimed and I can't find that data.
- pnutjam 7y agoThey end up shuffling between homelessness, homeless programs, and family / friends. A good portion of the children pass through the foster care system and the adults end up in jail or prison for various stretches. It's a very expensive system, and people's lives are wasted even if they are not out right killed.
- maxlybbert 7y agoI’m sure many people do shuffle through homelessness and homeless programs, but it’s certainly not half the country. Seriously, unless next week’s headline is “millions of Americans have been dying of starvation and nobody noticed,” the article has no connection to reality.
- skrebbel 7y ago> They end up shuffling between homelessness, homeless programs, and family / friends. 51 million people? A sixth of the US?
- fuzz4lyfe 7y ago51 million households, assuming 4 per household roughly 200 million or 2/3rds. I'm not buying it.
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- LUmBULtERA 7y ago>"For instance, in Seattle's King County, the annual household survival budget for a family of four (including one infant and one preschooler) in 2016 was nearly $85,000." An $85,000 "budget" is needed for a 4-person household's "survival" in King County? Otherwise they're dying? Maybe United Way's underlying data explains this better, but CNN's conclusions don't seem well explained or supported. Edit: What's weird is if you look into the ALICE project's website, their number appears to be $74,052, not $85,000. [0] Also definition of Survival Budget is on that page, but the definition of "survival" is a bit different than a standard dictionary. [0] https://www.unitedforalice.org/washington https://www.unitedforalice.org/washington
- CabSauce 7y ago>"households don't earn enough to afford a monthly budget that includes housing, food, child care, health care, transportation and a cell phone" Literally the first line of the article.
- j4kp07 7y ago1) Get rid of the cellphone 2) Cancel your cable/streaming subscriptions 3) Starting cooking meals at home 4) Apply for ACA
- Brendinooo 7y agoYeah, but dig into the specifics. OP's link allocated $586 a month for food - my family is bigger than the example, and we spend about half of that on groceries. We'll eat out to make up some of the difference, but if we're getting fast food once or twice a week, I wouldn't say we are in a "survival" scenario. Child care is also assumed here, but is not necessary in a two-parent home. Take that off the board and you free up around $15k, as well as some of the tax money as well. And does that tax estimate include the $2k/kid child tax credit? What is "Miscellaneous"? The hourly wage assumes a 2000-hour work year. So theoretically two people could work $15.50/hour jobs and meet this requirement, or you could knock the food budget in half, drop child care, and get the total hourly wage down to $21.50 an hour. That could be one parent working 20 hours a week at $10/hr and another working 40/week at $17/hr. Or someone could earn extra hours to get some spending money. I do that to supplement my family's income. I dunno. "Survival" is such a strong word, and I'm really skeptical that it applies here.
- shijie 7y agoThis is quite a disingenuous title for CNN. The actual study reference in the article (and not even directly, one must go to the linked website and dig around for it) identifies a new subgroup of the US population that are "asset-limited, income-constrained, and employed," or ALICE. Nowhere does it say in the study that these people cannot afford rent and food. These people's financial stability is more tenuous, yes, but they can afford rent and food. What a silly and dishonest conclusion made by CNN.
- isabella_r 7y agoAgree. I'm actually surprised that only 40% are considered ALICE. Is everyone else asset-unlimited, income-infinite?
- sys_64738 7y ago"asset-limited, income-constrained, and employed" AKA have no savings and have minimum wage jobs. The USA needs universal healthcare for all.