5 ms·

What did poverty look like for you? I am also from somewhere very different from this, though I can't say I grew up poor, we did okay.

Tade0 5y ago
For me it was mostly not being able to afford school books and clothes, shoes other than Chinese supermarket stuff - so something that wouldn't last two seasons. Also five people living in a 45m2 apartment - thankfully only until I was twelve or so. We reached a low point as a family when I was in college and my father, who left a few years earlier, stopped supporting us. Fortunately by that time I had a part-time job and could at least pay for my own food and cleaning products most of the time. My SO had it worse though - four people in a studio apartment until she was about eleven and her father, the sole consistent breadwinner, left when she was a teenager, from which point on they had to sustain themselves on alimony and occasional jobs their mother would take.
- burntoutfire 5y ago
  A family member has told me a story of her poor childhood in the thirties in rural Poland. During springs, their family had to steal rotten potatoes from other people's fields and eat weeds to survive. THAT's being poor. What the original article describes sounds more like a anxiety over a risk of falling into poverty, than actual poverty.
  - kelnos 5y ago
    I think a more precise term for it might be "financially insecure". You can make things work, it involves a bit of scraping here and there, but you are one bad-luck event (unexpected medical bill, car break-down, etc.) from being unable to pay your regular bills. Being in such extreme poverty that you need to eat stolen rotten food and weeds is another category entirely.
    - znpy 5y ago
      > I think a more precise term for it might be "financially insecure". it really feels like you're sugarcoating it. if having "to steal rotten potatoes from other people's fields and eat weeds to survive" is not being poor, then i don't know what is.
      - kyawzazaw 5y ago
        They were using the term "financially insecure" for the author situation. Not the stealing potatoes situation.
  - pschuegr 5y ago
    What you're describing sounds like "destitute", not poor.
    - daddylongstroke 5y ago
      I don't know - my mom and dad both subsistence farmed in Poland in the 50s through 70s (and largely never stopped). For sure we had to eat weeds (I continue to), and sometimes steal some "not great" potatoes or other vegetables or fruits. Don't knock it till you try though, those "weeds" are often waaaaay more nutritious than the store-bought bullshit, and often much more delicious. Unfortunately, often those 'weeds' were cultivated by a single family (and kept in the family and protected as a secret to surviving the next big one), and now they're nothing but a memory.

Tade0 5y ago

For me it was mostly not being able to afford school books and clothes, shoes other than Chinese supermarket stuff - so something that wouldn't last two seasons. Also five people living in a 45m2 apartment - thankfully only until I was twelve or so. We reached a low point as a family when I was in college and my father, who left a few years earlier, stopped supporting us. Fortunately by that time I had a part-time job and could at least pay for my own food and cleaning products most of the time. My SO had it worse though - four people in a studio apartment until she was about eleven and her father, the sole consistent breadwinner, left when she was a teenager, from which point on they had to sustain themselves on alimony and occasional jobs their mother would take.

burntoutfire 5y ago
A family member has told me a story of her poor childhood in the thirties in rural Poland. During springs, their family had to steal rotten potatoes from other people's fields and eat weeds to survive. THAT's being poor. What the original article describes sounds more like a anxiety over a risk of falling into poverty, than actual poverty.
- kelnos 5y ago
  I think a more precise term for it might be "financially insecure". You can make things work, it involves a bit of scraping here and there, but you are one bad-luck event (unexpected medical bill, car break-down, etc.) from being unable to pay your regular bills. Being in such extreme poverty that you need to eat stolen rotten food and weeds is another category entirely.
  - znpy 5y ago
    > I think a more precise term for it might be "financially insecure". it really feels like you're sugarcoating it. if having "to steal rotten potatoes from other people's fields and eat weeds to survive" is not being poor, then i don't know what is.
    - kyawzazaw 5y ago
      They were using the term "financially insecure" for the author situation. Not the stealing potatoes situation.
- pschuegr 5y ago
  What you're describing sounds like "destitute", not poor.
  - daddylongstroke 5y ago
    I don't know - my mom and dad both subsistence farmed in Poland in the 50s through 70s (and largely never stopped). For sure we had to eat weeds (I continue to), and sometimes steal some "not great" potatoes or other vegetables or fruits. Don't knock it till you try though, those "weeds" are often waaaaay more nutritious than the store-bought bullshit, and often much more delicious. Unfortunately, often those 'weeds' were cultivated by a single family (and kept in the family and protected as a secret to surviving the next big one), and now they're nothing but a memory.