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>How would having money solve money problems? That's really the question? I have shown that they do have $500 to cover an emergency but they have chosen to spe

>How would having money solve money problems? That's really the question? I have shown that they do have $500 to cover an emergency but they have chosen to spend it on lottery tickets and tobacco products. You claim that this is due to being poor and how they have poor impulse control and that makes them unable to save the money and instead the immediately spend it. If I give them another $500 why wouldn't they just spent that on more lottery tickets and tobacco products?

ceejayoz 7y ago
> I have shown that they do have $500 to cover an emergency You have not. You've shown that after a year of not buying lottery tickets they might have that $500, with the caveat of the fact that we know that's not really how that works - any savings gets wiped out by the next unexpected bill long before that. > If I give them another $500 why wouldn't they just spent that too? Where was that suggested? That's a silly approach to the problem. Far more comprehensive solutions are necessary. Better housing policy, living wage, national healthcare, better regulation (or banning) of payday loans, guaranteed access to banking services, etc.
- fuzz4lyfe 7y ago
  >You have not. You've shown that after a year of not buying lottery tickets they might have that $500, with the caveat of the fact that we know that's not really how that works - any savings gets wiped out by the next unexpected bill long before that. I don't see how this math works. Lets say my total annual income is $5000 to keep the math easy. My spending looks like this: get $5000 paycheck (for the sake of ease of math) spend $3000 on rent spend $500 on lottery tickets spend $1000 on food spend $500 on tobacco Now I have a $500 bill that I don't have the money for. Conversely I could: get $5000 paycheck spend $3000 on rent spend $1000 on food Now I have a $500 bill that I can cover because I did not buy all those lottery tickets.
  - ceejayoz 7y ago
    You continue to pretend poverty doesn't have one key fact: There are always more bills to pay. Your car breaks down. You get a parking ticket. Your kid gets sick. You get evicted and some of your stuff gets ruined by the rainstorm because the landlord put it on the lawn.
    - JoeAltmaier 7y ago
      Exactly. Car-job-house, lose one and the other two quickly fall. You're one bill away from homelessness. As a Markov chain, ultimately everyone in poverty crashes at some point or another.
    - fuzz4lyfe 7y ago
      >There are always more bills to pay. If saving money causes more bills to appear as you suggest the solutions seems to be to give the poor less money so they will have less bills.
      - ceejayoz 7y ago
        > If saving money causes more bills to appear Sigh. I'm not sure if this is a comprehension issue or if you're deliberately misrepresenting what I'm saying. Saving doesn't cause bills to appear. The bills are already there. They've likely been piling up for years, and continue to do so. If you're $20k in debt, and it keeps growing, and every time you've tried to save up a few dollars to pay it down you've had to spend the couple bucks you managed to accrue on yet another critical bill you can't put off any longer, it starts to feel pointless to save. > you suggest the solutions seems to be to give the poor less money What? I laid out specific, systemic interventions that are necessary, none of which require giving the poor less money.
        fuzz4lyfe 7y ago
        >The bills are already there. They've likely been piling up for years, and continue to do so. >If you're $20k in debt, and it keeps growing, and every time you've tried to save up a few dollars to pay it down you've had to spend the couple bucks you managed to accrue on yet another critical bill you can't put off any longer, it starts to feel pointless to save. If they have so much debt buying so many lottery tickets? Seems like a bad idea. What if they never bought lottery tickets to begin with? Who keeps extending them credit when they clearly never pay any bills? Do you extend this same logic to firms like Amazon? Amazon spends virtually every dollar they make, does that mean they are poor? Should the government step in a give them money because of how poor they are? I don't see why, "You have to stop buying lottery tickets" is a non-starter when talking about Americas poor. First stop buying lottery tickets, then we can talk about money problems you may have.

ceejayoz 7y ago

> I have shown that they do have $500 to cover an emergency You have not. You've shown that after a year of not buying lottery tickets they might have that $500, with the caveat of the fact that we know that's not really how that works - any savings gets wiped out by the next unexpected bill long before that. > If I give them another $500 why wouldn't they just spent that too? Where was that suggested? That's a silly approach to the problem. Far more comprehensive solutions are necessary. Better housing policy, living wage, national healthcare, better regulation (or banning) of payday loans, guaranteed access to banking services, etc.

fuzz4lyfe 7y ago
>You have not. You've shown that after a year of not buying lottery tickets they might have that $500, with the caveat of the fact that we know that's not really how that works - any savings gets wiped out by the next unexpected bill long before that. I don't see how this math works. Lets say my total annual income is $5000 to keep the math easy. My spending looks like this: get $5000 paycheck (for the sake of ease of math) spend $3000 on rent spend $500 on lottery tickets spend $1000 on food spend $500 on tobacco Now I have a $500 bill that I don't have the money for. Conversely I could: get $5000 paycheck spend $3000 on rent spend $1000 on food Now I have a $500 bill that I can cover because I did not buy all those lottery tickets.
- ceejayoz 7y ago
  You continue to pretend poverty doesn't have one key fact: There are always more bills to pay. Your car breaks down. You get a parking ticket. Your kid gets sick. You get evicted and some of your stuff gets ruined by the rainstorm because the landlord put it on the lawn.
  - JoeAltmaier 7y ago
    Exactly. Car-job-house, lose one and the other two quickly fall. You're one bill away from homelessness. As a Markov chain, ultimately everyone in poverty crashes at some point or another.
  - fuzz4lyfe 7y ago
    >There are always more bills to pay. If saving money causes more bills to appear as you suggest the solutions seems to be to give the poor less money so they will have less bills.
    - ceejayoz 7y ago
      > If saving money causes more bills to appear Sigh. I'm not sure if this is a comprehension issue or if you're deliberately misrepresenting what I'm saying. Saving doesn't cause bills to appear. The bills are already there. They've likely been piling up for years, and continue to do so. If you're $20k in debt, and it keeps growing, and every time you've tried to save up a few dollars to pay it down you've had to spend the couple bucks you managed to accrue on yet another critical bill you can't put off any longer, it starts to feel pointless to save. > you suggest the solutions seems to be to give the poor less money What? I laid out specific, systemic interventions that are necessary, none of which require giving the poor less money.
      - fuzz4lyfe 7y ago
        >The bills are already there. They've likely been piling up for years, and continue to do so. >If you're $20k in debt, and it keeps growing, and every time you've tried to save up a few dollars to pay it down you've had to spend the couple bucks you managed to accrue on yet another critical bill you can't put off any longer, it starts to feel pointless to save. If they have so much debt buying so many lottery tickets? Seems like a bad idea. What if they never bought lottery tickets to begin with? Who keeps extending them credit when they clearly never pay any bills? Do you extend this same logic to firms like Amazon? Amazon spends virtually every dollar they make, does that mean they are poor? Should the government step in a give them money because of how poor they are? I don't see why, "You have to stop buying lottery tickets" is a non-starter when talking about Americas poor. First stop buying lottery tickets, then we can talk about money problems you may have.