Being impoverished doesn't just mean that you spend more time (and money) to get the same things[1] -- it means that the amount of effort you spend worrying abo

Being impoverished doesn't just mean that you spend more time (and money) to get the same things[1] -- it means that the amount of effort you spend worrying about things that the non-impoverished take for granted reduces your ability to make good decisions overall[2]. People who haven't read e.g. Adam Smith on linen shirts like to take the image of a poor person with a wedding ring or a television and hold it up as an example of excess, but when you see widespread behavior that appears irrational, the right response is not to criticize it on those grounds, but to try to understand why it's happening. It's always happening for a reason. 1: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/05/17/AR2009051702053_pf.html http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/05... 2: http://thepsychreport.com/research-application/featured-research/the-cognitive-burden-of-poverty/ http://thepsychreport.com/research-application/featured-rese...