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> I made it and you can too. Poverty has no color. It impacts everyone. You can't tell just by looking at someone. I love your story. There's also a ton of peo

by whack 6y ago

> I made it and you can too. Poverty has no color. It impacts everyone. You can't tell just by looking at someone. I love your story. There's also a ton of people who will delight in cherry-picking your story, as justification for not expanding the social safety net. "throwaway-0987 did it, and you can too! You just need to stop being so lazy" A few factors to consider: - You had an aunt you could live with - As a youth, you were wise enough to go to trade school and college - As a youth, you were wise/careful enough to not have babies. Furthering your education would be far tougher when you have kids to take care of - You had access to government programs such as Pell Grants, which many people would deride as being "government handouts" - As a youth, you were wise enough to avoid crimes that would disqualify you from educational/employment opportunities in your adult life Stories like yours are wonderful in inspiring people to make something of themselves. But it doesn't change the fact that we as a society should do more to help people who are caught in a poverty trap, especially because of poor decisions made when they were teenagers. Just because someone ran a 4-minute-mile doesn't mean it's reasonable to expect everyone to do so. > Anyway, people think I'm 'privileged' now because I earn a lot of money, but they have no idea that I used to sleep on the floor and eat in soup lines. As always in such discussions, privilege is on a spectrum and has many dimensions. To give an obvious example, even as a youth, you were privileged to be an American citizen, with all the rights, assistance and opportunities it entails. If you were born in the same circumstances in Mexico or Congo, you would find yourself facing a far different outcome.

theodric 6y ago
Insufferable.
asdfasgasdgasdg 6y ago
Does it really help to inform someone sharing a story of their privation that they could have had it worse? I mean I am on board with the notion that there are various aspects of privilege, and that someone who had it hard in some dimension might have some privilege in others. But it doesn't seem like an appropriate response in this context.
- alephu5 6y ago
  Read the conclusion again.
  - birdyrooster 6y ago
    The conclusion is that poverty from systemic racism doesn’t exist. I don’t know how he ended up there but now I understand the need for a throwaway.
    - ljm 6y ago
      The conclusion is that it is a class problem, and there are many mechanisms at play that keep the rich rich and the poor poor. That's the compassionate read on it.
dahfizz 6y ago
3 of the 5 factors you list boil down to "OP made good decisions and worked hard". I'm not sure how that is a counter argument to "throwaway-0987 did it, and you can too! You just need to stop being so lazy". From their description, it doesn't sound like living with his Aunt was a tremendous boon either. I don't mean to argue against a social safety net (free college in this example was certainly a good thing). I just mean to say that you can't discount the importance of hard work and good judgement. The government can not and should not lift people out of poverty if those people refuse to work to better themselves.
- relaxing 6y ago
  Living with anyone beats being out on the street. And probably beat being in the foster system.
  - sigstoat 6y ago
    > Living with anyone beats being out on the street a lot of folks on the street disagree
    - raverbashing 6y ago
      Some have left unsustainable situations, but some were the a-hole of the situations.
- whimsicalism 6y ago
  > The government can not and should not lift people out of poverty if those people refuse to work to better themselves. I think everyone is deserving of not living in poverty. Even "lazy" people.
  - dahfizz 6y ago
    For some definition of "deserving", I would agree. Certainly, everyone should have the tools and opportunities they need to build the life they want. Society has limited resources. Until we manage the post-scarcity utopia, I would prefer my tax dollars go to someone who will use them to build a better life.
rossdavidh 6y ago
If you're talking to the people in the professional class already, your points are valid. If you're talking to someone in OP's situation back then, your points are dispiriting. I know you didn't mean it that way, but it is important to a person who is in a disadvantaged situation to not hear well-meaning members of the professional class saying what sounds like, "you can't make your situation better until the whole system is changed". I think OP's statement of "I made it and you can too" was clearly aimed, not at you or me probably, but a person in the same situation that OP was in years ago.
- jrochkind1 6y ago
  you make a good point. The trick is separating "Don't give up" from "it's your fault if you haven't escpaed poverty." Cause it's also dispiriting to have worked your ass off for 10+ years and still be poor and have someone telling you if you were trying hard enough you would be in a different position.
  - rossdavidh 6y ago
    I agree with that as well.
    - jrochkind1 6y ago
      As I come back to this again I guess here's what I think it's really about: The implication that there's some correlation between how hard you work and poverty. But most poor people I know work way harder than most "professional" people I know. If there's a correlation, it seems to me to be the reverse, poor people are, by neccessity to survive, as a general rule hustling a lot harder than wealthier people. As the OP actually kind of outlines.
lc9er 6y ago
> There's also a ton of people who will delight in cherry-picking your story, as justification for not expanding the social safety net. "throwaway-0987 did it, and you can too! You just need to stop being so lazy" > we as a society should do more to help people who are caught in a poverty trap, especially because of poor decisions made when they were teenagers. Just because someone ran a 4-minute-mile doesn't mean it's reasonable to expect everyone to do so. Yes. Thank you. Lots of people start out poor and make it out. I did. Many friends did. But just as many did not. And it had _zero_ to do with "hard work". Almost all of it had to with the lack of a robust safety need and the need to (endlessly) prioritize survival.
chmod600 6y ago
When wearing your policymaking hat, I agree that you should consider what people actually do (which is not always wise) rather than just what they should do. But when actually struggling (or perhaps even when comfortable), you should forget about policy and fairness and just make the best decisions you can and keep trying to do the right thing, and that gives you or your children or grandchildren the best chance to make it to a comfortable place. You are obvioualy wearing your policymaking hat. Unfortunately, policymaking is and endless mess of arguing and distracts real people from doing the right thing. Calling things "unfair", even if true, is discouraging for struggling people and makes them less likely to succeed if they listen to you. The fact is that there's a lot of opportunity here, and a lot of people in the world realize that and come here to realize the opportunity. Any message of unfairness, in my opinion, should be coupled with the context that the best way forward is still by prudent choices and a multi-generational outlook. Like so many immigrants have. You call poverty a "trap", but part of that is imposed by a given location. That coal mining town might never come back, and opportunities will be scarce. But growing cities will always offer opportunity to newcomers. It's much easier to "immigrate" from a declining city/town to a growing one than from another country. This is not to say that we can't improve policy. We can. But the constant drumbeat of unfairness and victimhood is a counterproductive tactic in the policymaking process.
- Gravityloss 6y ago
  Seems high crime rate decreases the efficiency and well being of societies a lot. The person can't live in a dense area and must have a car, to avoid other people since they are potentially dangerous. Also their workplace is in a dangerous area. So a large portion of their money goes to transportation and housing. What if they were just as poor but the crime rate in general was just lower? They could live in dense housing and use public transport all day, as could the spouse and the kids. To an outsider, this seems like a really big factor.
- estaseuropano 6y ago
  How about a reality hat: the world does not offer everyone equal chances. You live in a country surrounded by fences and border patrol exactly to keep those that were less lucky from trying to get some of that luck. Even when born in the country, there are better and worse schools, better and worse social infrastructure, a billion different glass ceilings according to color, gender, age, accent or faith. Your comment perpetuates the eternal lie that everyone can rise to the top, but we all know that some have a 50% chance and others a 0.0005% chance to 'make it'. It's absurd to blame the kid with a bad school and no breakfast for not living up to the highest moral standards and take all the right decisions when they have probably barely to no good advice, guidance or role models. Its easy to judge, but try to empathise. That's not a policy hat, it's acknowledging reality.
asoneth 6y ago
In my experience, an individual who believes that success is the result of hard work will end up being more successful than a similar individual who believes that success is primarily due to starting conditions or luck. At the same time, government policies that acknowledge that success is hugely dependent on starting conditions and luck seem to result in more equitable societies. (i.e. higher Gini coefficient or Shorrocks index) I don’t think there's an inherent conflict between those perspectives -- it's boiling them down to two-dimensional strawman arguments that makes them look that way.
- opportune 6y ago
  Fully agreed. At an individual level, there are often decisions you can make regarding career choices, saving, when to have children, etc. that can greatly impact your financial situation down the line. At a societal level, not every single person can be a software engineer, UI designer, realtor, etc. And additionally some fraction of people simply will make mistakes or not-strictly-optimal decisions. It’s a balancing act recognizing that individual decisions can have an impact on outcomes, that some portion of people will still suffer anyway, and alleviating that suffering as much as possible without creating a cycle of dependence/socializing the costs of easily fixed issues.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
jimbokun 6y ago
I don't like your take, either, as it suggests we shouldn't push young people to make good decisions where possible. I think what both approaches miss, is the biggest underlying problem is Cost Disease: https://slatestarcodex.com/2017/02/09/considerations-on-cost-disease/ https://slatestarcodex.com/2017/02/09/considerations-on-cost... Reeling in out of control price increases on the most important expenses like health care, education and housing would do more to improve the lot of the poor than any redistribution scheme. Now, redistribution may be a necessary part of lowering costs. Like establishing government run health care to control cost increases and investing in public universities to radically reduce or eliminate tuition. This approach helps everyone, but disproportionately helps the poor. And controlling costs will help the poor more in the long run, I believe, than any redistribution scheme that doesn't address skyrocketing costs.
Siira 6y ago
“Wise enough” is not quite the word for some of these points, “self-controlled enough” is. And giving bail-outs, either to individuals or big corporations, will always distort their incentives to take more risks, save less, spend more, and generally act more selfishly. If you’re going to give bail-outs, at least make sure you give more to responsible, “wise enough” people, or your recipients will experience a shrewd lapse of judgement.

by whack 6y ago

theodric 6y ago

Insufferable.

asdfasgasdgasdg 6y ago

Does it really help to inform someone sharing a story of their privation that they could have had it worse? I mean I am on board with the notion that there are various aspects of privilege, and that someone who had it hard in some dimension might have some privilege in others. But it doesn't seem like an appropriate response in this context.

alephu5 6y ago
Read the conclusion again.
- birdyrooster 6y ago
  The conclusion is that poverty from systemic racism doesn’t exist. I don’t know how he ended up there but now I understand the need for a throwaway.
  - ljm 6y ago
    The conclusion is that it is a class problem, and there are many mechanisms at play that keep the rich rich and the poor poor. That's the compassionate read on it.

dahfizz 6y ago

3 of the 5 factors you list boil down to "OP made good decisions and worked hard". I'm not sure how that is a counter argument to "throwaway-0987 did it, and you can too! You just need to stop being so lazy". From their description, it doesn't sound like living with his Aunt was a tremendous boon either. I don't mean to argue against a social safety net (free college in this example was certainly a good thing). I just mean to say that you can't discount the importance of hard work and good judgement. The government can not and should not lift people out of poverty if those people refuse to work to better themselves.

relaxing 6y ago
Living with anyone beats being out on the street. And probably beat being in the foster system.
- sigstoat 6y ago
  > Living with anyone beats being out on the street a lot of folks on the street disagree
  - raverbashing 6y ago
    Some have left unsustainable situations, but some were the a-hole of the situations.
whimsicalism 6y ago
> The government can not and should not lift people out of poverty if those people refuse to work to better themselves. I think everyone is deserving of not living in poverty. Even "lazy" people.
- dahfizz 6y ago
  For some definition of "deserving", I would agree. Certainly, everyone should have the tools and opportunities they need to build the life they want. Society has limited resources. Until we manage the post-scarcity utopia, I would prefer my tax dollars go to someone who will use them to build a better life.

rossdavidh 6y ago

If you're talking to the people in the professional class already, your points are valid. If you're talking to someone in OP's situation back then, your points are dispiriting. I know you didn't mean it that way, but it is important to a person who is in a disadvantaged situation to not hear well-meaning members of the professional class saying what sounds like, "you can't make your situation better until the whole system is changed". I think OP's statement of "I made it and you can too" was clearly aimed, not at you or me probably, but a person in the same situation that OP was in years ago.

jrochkind1 6y ago
you make a good point. The trick is separating "Don't give up" from "it's your fault if you haven't escpaed poverty." Cause it's also dispiriting to have worked your ass off for 10+ years and still be poor and have someone telling you if you were trying hard enough you would be in a different position.
- rossdavidh 6y ago
  I agree with that as well.
  - jrochkind1 6y ago
    As I come back to this again I guess here's what I think it's really about: The implication that there's some correlation between how hard you work and poverty. But most poor people I know work way harder than most "professional" people I know. If there's a correlation, it seems to me to be the reverse, poor people are, by neccessity to survive, as a general rule hustling a lot harder than wealthier people. As the OP actually kind of outlines.

lc9er 6y ago

> There's also a ton of people who will delight in cherry-picking your story, as justification for not expanding the social safety net. "throwaway-0987 did it, and you can too! You just need to stop being so lazy" > we as a society should do more to help people who are caught in a poverty trap, especially because of poor decisions made when they were teenagers. Just because someone ran a 4-minute-mile doesn't mean it's reasonable to expect everyone to do so. Yes. Thank you. Lots of people start out poor and make it out. I did. Many friends did. But just as many did not. And it had _zero_ to do with "hard work". Almost all of it had to with the lack of a robust safety need and the need to (endlessly) prioritize survival.

chmod600 6y ago

When wearing your policymaking hat, I agree that you should consider what people actually do (which is not always wise) rather than just what they should do. But when actually struggling (or perhaps even when comfortable), you should forget about policy and fairness and just make the best decisions you can and keep trying to do the right thing, and that gives you or your children or grandchildren the best chance to make it to a comfortable place. You are obvioualy wearing your policymaking hat. Unfortunately, policymaking is and endless mess of arguing and distracts real people from doing the right thing. Calling things "unfair", even if true, is discouraging for struggling people and makes them less likely to succeed if they listen to you. The fact is that there's a lot of opportunity here, and a lot of people in the world realize that and come here to realize the opportunity. Any message of unfairness, in my opinion, should be coupled with the context that the best way forward is still by prudent choices and a multi-generational outlook. Like so many immigrants have. You call poverty a "trap", but part of that is imposed by a given location. That coal mining town might never come back, and opportunities will be scarce. But growing cities will always offer opportunity to newcomers. It's much easier to "immigrate" from a declining city/town to a growing one than from another country. This is not to say that we can't improve policy. We can. But the constant drumbeat of unfairness and victimhood is a counterproductive tactic in the policymaking process.

Gravityloss 6y ago
Seems high crime rate decreases the efficiency and well being of societies a lot. The person can't live in a dense area and must have a car, to avoid other people since they are potentially dangerous. Also their workplace is in a dangerous area. So a large portion of their money goes to transportation and housing. What if they were just as poor but the crime rate in general was just lower? They could live in dense housing and use public transport all day, as could the spouse and the kids. To an outsider, this seems like a really big factor.
estaseuropano 6y ago
How about a reality hat: the world does not offer everyone equal chances. You live in a country surrounded by fences and border patrol exactly to keep those that were less lucky from trying to get some of that luck. Even when born in the country, there are better and worse schools, better and worse social infrastructure, a billion different glass ceilings according to color, gender, age, accent or faith. Your comment perpetuates the eternal lie that everyone can rise to the top, but we all know that some have a 50% chance and others a 0.0005% chance to 'make it'. It's absurd to blame the kid with a bad school and no breakfast for not living up to the highest moral standards and take all the right decisions when they have probably barely to no good advice, guidance or role models. Its easy to judge, but try to empathise. That's not a policy hat, it's acknowledging reality.

asoneth 6y ago

In my experience, an individual who believes that success is the result of hard work will end up being more successful than a similar individual who believes that success is primarily due to starting conditions or luck. At the same time, government policies that acknowledge that success is hugely dependent on starting conditions and luck seem to result in more equitable societies. (i.e. higher Gini coefficient or Shorrocks index) I don’t think there's an inherent conflict between those perspectives -- it's boiling them down to two-dimensional strawman arguments that makes them look that way.

opportune 6y ago
Fully agreed. At an individual level, there are often decisions you can make regarding career choices, saving, when to have children, etc. that can greatly impact your financial situation down the line. At a societal level, not every single person can be a software engineer, UI designer, realtor, etc. And additionally some fraction of people simply will make mistakes or not-strictly-optimal decisions. It’s a balancing act recognizing that individual decisions can have an impact on outcomes, that some portion of people will still suffer anyway, and alleviating that suffering as much as possible without creating a cycle of dependence/socializing the costs of easily fixed issues.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

jimbokun 6y ago

I don't like your take, either, as it suggests we shouldn't push young people to make good decisions where possible. I think what both approaches miss, is the biggest underlying problem is Cost Disease: https://slatestarcodex.com/2017/02/09/considerations-on-cost-disease/ https://slatestarcodex.com/2017/02/09/considerations-on-cost... Reeling in out of control price increases on the most important expenses like health care, education and housing would do more to improve the lot of the poor than any redistribution scheme. Now, redistribution may be a necessary part of lowering costs. Like establishing government run health care to control cost increases and investing in public universities to radically reduce or eliminate tuition. This approach helps everyone, but disproportionately helps the poor. And controlling costs will help the poor more in the long run, I believe, than any redistribution scheme that doesn't address skyrocketing costs.

Siira 6y ago

“Wise enough” is not quite the word for some of these points, “self-controlled enough” is. And giving bail-outs, either to individuals or big corporations, will always distort their incentives to take more risks, save less, spend more, and generally act more selfishly. If you’re going to give bail-outs, at least make sure you give more to responsible, “wise enough” people, or your recipients will experience a shrewd lapse of judgement.