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There are some places you can go to college while working a part time minimum wage job during the school year and full time in the summer and graduate with only

by troupe 6y ago

There are some places you can go to college while working a part time minimum wage job during the school year and full time in the summer and graduate with only a few thousand dollars of debt while paying all your expenses. Just because an expensive new car is very expensive does not mean that a vehicle is out of reach of everyone who can't afford an expensive new vehicle. The market will only adjust wages if people are behaving rationally. Staying in a very expensive place with low wages breaks the market because it isn't rational behavior.

hapless 6y ago
It may surprise you to learn that moving is expensive and difficult
- troupe 6y ago
  There definitely is a cost associated with moving to a place where the skills you have are valued enough to support yourself. If the pain of changing is greater than the pain of staying where you are, then it is completely rational to stay where you are.
pydry 6y ago
Some of the most desperate people I know are ones who grew up poor in a HCOL city (NYC, London, etc.) and who fell into low wage jobs. At the same time as supporting the cities they live in doing all of the most fundamental work (cooking, cleaning, etc) they are regularly disrespected and told to fuck off somewhere else if they're struggling - away from the support network they rely upon and the friends and family who give their life meaning. And yeah, some of them did move away but that sometimes made things worse because even though they might be financially slightly better situated in a different city, they didn't have a support network there. Expensive housing is a political choice. Watering down the minimum wage was a political choice. These people falling through the cracks and suffering was the outcome of those deliberate choices to prioritize pumping up asset prices and profit margins over actual people.
- Jetrel 6y ago
  Yeah, this is spot on. Most people don't quite understand how homelessness works, and it's because of this whole "support network" thing. In most people's mind, homeless = bum living in a cardboard box. What actually happens in reality is someone falls on hard times and they move in with a relative, or bum a room from a friend, or etc, etc. That's what keeps them out of the cardboard box, and keeps them fed. And that's why they're shit scared to move. Move, and all those friends and family can't help you. Even scarier, move, and you're probably scared the whole friends-and-family ties might get weaker - most people are always paranoid about whether their friends/lovers/etc still care about them, so they stay close to make sure they're "tending the fire" and keeping the friendship alive. It's human.
RangerScience 6y ago
> The market It is known that the FSP is holy, for it shall cure all our ails with nary a lift of our clicky fingers. /snark. The market is us. We will adjust wages if people are behaving rationally - but people don't. The market isn't some external, independently existing force; it's observations about our collective actions. We're the market. It's weird (to me) every time that term is used that way. > it isn't rational behavior Of course not, people aren't rational, but even if they were, you'd still be (generally) incorrect. People coming to decisions that are against your expectations is much more commonly about your lack of visibility into other forces and information than it is about their cognitive processing.
- troupe 6y ago
  One perspective is that people aren't rational. Another is that they are optimizing for different things than what you want to optimize for.
klyrs 6y ago
Last car I bought cost about $3000. Cost of insurance? Over half that, annually. More expensive if you do a monthly payment plan. And that's with a spotless driving record and favorable demographics. And then comes maintenance of a 30yo vehicle! Total cost of ownership was about $3k/y, not including gas. Even cheap cars ain't cheap, and that's one of many reasons that poverty is a spiral.
- BeetleB 6y ago
  > Last car I bought cost about $3000. Cost of insurance? Over half that, annually. How bad is your driving record, and are you getting anything beyond liability? I have paid about that much, for 2 cars, and I have a lot more than liability. Even now, for 2 cars I'm paying under $1300/year - and have more than liability coverage. When I paid the bare minimum, for 1 car, the most I paid is $600/year. Even adjusting for inflation, it would not amount to over $1000/year today. And I paid that only for 1-2 years while building enough of a driving record. Looking at my financial records, when I had just liability on an old car, I typically paid $350/year. > More expensive if you do a monthly payment plan. Not all plans are like this. For the last few years I've been on a plan that costs the same whether I do monthly or annual. Shop around. > And then comes maintenance of a 30yo vehicle! Total cost of ownership was about $3k/y First, if you paid $3000 for a 30 year old car, it's a bad deal. 2 years ago I bought a 15 year of Honda Accord for $3500, and it did not have a lot of miles. Second, if you're paying $3000/year for maintenance, you bought a bad car. Sell it and get a reliable car. As an example, I paid $350 this year for maintaining my car (including oil changes). I paid about $1100 last year. Looking at my prior old car, I've gone as low as $100/year. In fact, looking back at almost 10 years, that $1100 was the most I've ever paid for maintaining an old car. > Even cheap cars ain't cheap, and that's one of many reasons that poverty is a spiral. Good cheap cars are always cheaper than the alternatives. Always.
InvisibleUp 6y ago
As a personal anecdote, I'm a college student who started at community college, worked during the summers, and even worked during the semester at jobs paying over $15/hr. Despite all of that, despite rarely if ever spending any money on "fun" things, I'm $30,000 in debt. Tuition and rent are just that expensive now. It's almost impossible to save up when you're throwing just about every dollar you're making just to keep yourself afloat.
- troupe 6y ago
  My local community college costs about $11k per year. That includes room, board, books, tuition, and $4,000 of personal expenses for transportation, etc. The closest university is about $16k for everything except personal expenses, so let's add $4k to that to get to $20k (probably a bit high, but we'll use it to use). So that would come to: $11k $11k $20k $20k ----- $62k The $16k we budgeted for personal expenses is probably a bit high and I living on campus is much more expensive than other options, but at $15 per hour, you'd only need to work half time to cover all your expenses. So lets say you work 20 hours a week for 39 weeks during the school year and 40 hours for 13 during the summer. That is 1,300 hours per year. You need to bring in $11.9 per hour to cover your expenses without being particularly frugal. If you live at home, live off campus and cook your own food, graduate a semester early, etc. you can drop your costs down by quite a bit. For students who did ok in highschool (3.5 GPA, 29 on ACT) the university will give you at least a $2k scholarship. Pell grants will give you up to $5k that you don't need to pay back depending on your financial need. Graduating debt free is very VERY doable.

by troupe 6y ago

hapless 6y ago

It may surprise you to learn that moving is expensive and difficult

troupe 6y ago
There definitely is a cost associated with moving to a place where the skills you have are valued enough to support yourself. If the pain of changing is greater than the pain of staying where you are, then it is completely rational to stay where you are.

pydry 6y ago

Some of the most desperate people I know are ones who grew up poor in a HCOL city (NYC, London, etc.) and who fell into low wage jobs. At the same time as supporting the cities they live in doing all of the most fundamental work (cooking, cleaning, etc) they are regularly disrespected and told to fuck off somewhere else if they're struggling - away from the support network they rely upon and the friends and family who give their life meaning. And yeah, some of them did move away but that sometimes made things worse because even though they might be financially slightly better situated in a different city, they didn't have a support network there. Expensive housing is a political choice. Watering down the minimum wage was a political choice. These people falling through the cracks and suffering was the outcome of those deliberate choices to prioritize pumping up asset prices and profit margins over actual people.

Jetrel 6y ago
Yeah, this is spot on. Most people don't quite understand how homelessness works, and it's because of this whole "support network" thing. In most people's mind, homeless = bum living in a cardboard box. What actually happens in reality is someone falls on hard times and they move in with a relative, or bum a room from a friend, or etc, etc. That's what keeps them out of the cardboard box, and keeps them fed. And that's why they're shit scared to move. Move, and all those friends and family can't help you. Even scarier, move, and you're probably scared the whole friends-and-family ties might get weaker - most people are always paranoid about whether their friends/lovers/etc still care about them, so they stay close to make sure they're "tending the fire" and keeping the friendship alive. It's human.

RangerScience 6y ago

> The market It is known that the FSP is holy, for it shall cure all our ails with nary a lift of our clicky fingers. /snark. The market is us. We will adjust wages if people are behaving rationally - but people don't. The market isn't some external, independently existing force; it's observations about our collective actions. We're the market. It's weird (to me) every time that term is used that way. > it isn't rational behavior Of course not, people aren't rational, but even if they were, you'd still be (generally) incorrect. People coming to decisions that are against your expectations is much more commonly about your lack of visibility into other forces and information than it is about their cognitive processing.

troupe 6y ago
One perspective is that people aren't rational. Another is that they are optimizing for different things than what you want to optimize for.

klyrs 6y ago

Last car I bought cost about $3000. Cost of insurance? Over half that, annually. More expensive if you do a monthly payment plan. And that's with a spotless driving record and favorable demographics. And then comes maintenance of a 30yo vehicle! Total cost of ownership was about $3k/y, not including gas. Even cheap cars ain't cheap, and that's one of many reasons that poverty is a spiral.

BeetleB 6y ago
> Last car I bought cost about $3000. Cost of insurance? Over half that, annually. How bad is your driving record, and are you getting anything beyond liability? I have paid about that much, for 2 cars, and I have a lot more than liability. Even now, for 2 cars I'm paying under $1300/year - and have more than liability coverage. When I paid the bare minimum, for 1 car, the most I paid is $600/year. Even adjusting for inflation, it would not amount to over $1000/year today. And I paid that only for 1-2 years while building enough of a driving record. Looking at my financial records, when I had just liability on an old car, I typically paid $350/year. > More expensive if you do a monthly payment plan. Not all plans are like this. For the last few years I've been on a plan that costs the same whether I do monthly or annual. Shop around. > And then comes maintenance of a 30yo vehicle! Total cost of ownership was about $3k/y First, if you paid $3000 for a 30 year old car, it's a bad deal. 2 years ago I bought a 15 year of Honda Accord for $3500, and it did not have a lot of miles. Second, if you're paying $3000/year for maintenance, you bought a bad car. Sell it and get a reliable car. As an example, I paid $350 this year for maintaining my car (including oil changes). I paid about $1100 last year. Looking at my prior old car, I've gone as low as $100/year. In fact, looking back at almost 10 years, that $1100 was the most I've ever paid for maintaining an old car. > Even cheap cars ain't cheap, and that's one of many reasons that poverty is a spiral. Good cheap cars are always cheaper than the alternatives. Always.

InvisibleUp 6y ago

As a personal anecdote, I'm a college student who started at community college, worked during the summers, and even worked during the semester at jobs paying over $15/hr. Despite all of that, despite rarely if ever spending any money on "fun" things, I'm $30,000 in debt. Tuition and rent are just that expensive now. It's almost impossible to save up when you're throwing just about every dollar you're making just to keep yourself afloat.

troupe 6y ago
My local community college costs about $11k per year. That includes room, board, books, tuition, and $4,000 of personal expenses for transportation, etc. The closest university is about $16k for everything except personal expenses, so let's add $4k to that to get to $20k (probably a bit high, but we'll use it to use). So that would come to: $11k $11k $20k $20k ----- $62k The $16k we budgeted for personal expenses is probably a bit high and I living on campus is much more expensive than other options, but at $15 per hour, you'd only need to work half time to cover all your expenses. So lets say you work 20 hours a week for 39 weeks during the school year and 40 hours for 13 during the summer. That is 1,300 hours per year. You need to bring in $11.9 per hour to cover your expenses without being particularly frugal. If you live at home, live off campus and cook your own food, graduate a semester early, etc. you can drop your costs down by quite a bit. For students who did ok in highschool (3.5 GPA, 29 on ACT) the university will give you at least a $2k scholarship. Pell grants will give you up to $5k that you don't need to pay back depending on your financial need. Graduating debt free is very VERY doable.