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"When you're in a spot so bad that you have maybe $20 a week for food and have bills and collections wanting everything you have, simple things like a new couch

"When you're in a spot so bad that you have maybe $20 a week for food and have bills and collections wanting everything you have, simple things like a new couch or speakers look like an escape, almost therapeutic, when you have nothing." This is something that most well off people have a hard time understanding. I remember well a story on NPR where a younger sibling scrimped and saved to buy his older brother a Nintendo DS, only to have an older and richer neighbor come over and berate him for wasting his money like that. When you're struggling every day to make ends meet, constantly worried about the future, and playing mental gymnastics to determine which bills you can afford to pay and still have food, even the smallest luxury is a relief.

notahacker 12y ago
I think we're conflating two different things here: there's a desire amongst the very poor to spend money on nonessential sources of digital entertainment which isn't necessarily that irrational. You'll find that holds in places where people earn far less than the US minimum wage and would never in their wildest dreams expect to own a sofa, a TV more than 17" across or even a trailer with actual glass in the windows; they're still very proud of their almost-smartphone and spend a lot of time glued to their CRT TV screen. There are also people with relatively limited education and intelligence and relatively high stress levels binging on furniture every time they walk into the store to make payments on the last item because they're extremely susceptible to the marketing messages that "normal" American families replace their sofas on a regular basis, and deferred payments are easier to keep up with.
gdilla 12y ago
A big issue here was the variable pay these people were getting. Obviously, that's no excuse to spend more than you make, but, it may help understand why it happens. If you have a steady paycheck, it's much easier to plan for things (even if it's a small paycheck).

notahacker 12y ago

I think we're conflating two different things here: there's a desire amongst the very poor to spend money on nonessential sources of digital entertainment which isn't necessarily that irrational. You'll find that holds in places where people earn far less than the US minimum wage and would never in their wildest dreams expect to own a sofa, a TV more than 17" across or even a trailer with actual glass in the windows; they're still very proud of their almost-smartphone and spend a lot of time glued to their CRT TV screen. There are also people with relatively limited education and intelligence and relatively high stress levels binging on furniture every time they walk into the store to make payments on the last item because they're extremely susceptible to the marketing messages that "normal" American families replace their sofas on a regular basis, and deferred payments are easier to keep up with.

gdilla 12y ago

A big issue here was the variable pay these people were getting. Obviously, that's no excuse to spend more than you make, but, it may help understand why it happens. If you have a steady paycheck, it's much easier to plan for things (even if it's a small paycheck).