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Victor Hanson Davis of the national review always drones about how today's poor don't have it so bad since they have access to big screen televisions and gadgets, which really misses the point that you can't really get much pleasure/utility out of such things if you're worried about feeding your kids or making rent and car payments.
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Or, government could make education more affordable and increase the percentage of the population with marketable skills.
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The rising cost of education is either going to do one of two things:
1. Create an economy where only the superwealthy can learn marketable skills, thereby creating a deficit in America's ability to innovate on par with the rest of the world, and, by extension, make us obsolete.
2. Create an economy where college educations are not needed to succeed.
Oh wait, these are both happening now.
If people can't afford to go to college, then the economy will have to adjust to its unskilled workers.
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quote:Originally posted by Mucus: That "if I make X% more than a particular past generation did, adjusted for inflation, but Y has gone up Z%" example also works the other way around.
My education may cost more, but my grand-parents may have been completely barred from being educated alongside white people in the first place. A wedding may cost more, but I don't have to worry about getting lynched or having a burning cross show up on my lawn if I marry the "wrong" person. A house may cost more, but I don't have to worry about a racist government confiscating the house and sending me to a concentration camp without compensation.
quote:Originally posted by Sa'eed: Victor Hanson Davis of the national review always drones about how today's poor don't have it so bad since they have access to big screen televisions and gadgets, which really misses the point that you can't really get much pleasure/utility out of such things if you're worried about feeding your kids or making rent and car payments.
"Gadgets." Yeah. Gadgets make life easier. And longer. Also they can improve your income, if you are so motivated.
For example: Most poor people in America have some access to the Internet. Which means, for example, that they could learn how to program. Rudimentary programming skills, regardless of education level, could easily lift them out of poverty
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quote:Originally posted by Sa'eed: Victor Hanson Davis of the national review always drones about how today's poor don't have it so bad since they have access to big screen televisions and gadgets, which really misses the point that you can't really get much pleasure/utility out of such things if you're worried about feeding your kids or making rent and car payments.
"Gadgets." Yeah. Gadgets make life easier. And longer. Also they can improve your income, if you are so motivated.
For example: Most poor people in America have some access to the Internet. Which means, for example, that they could learn how to program. Rudimentary programming skills, regardless of education level, could easily lift them out of poverty
That's a callous view. Most people don't have the brains for computer programming. Like, do you expect the high school C and D students who had a lot of trouble with Algebra 2 to learn C++?
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Shouldn't we be producing ideas and helping everyone else better their own ideas?
Please explain how this is not better than arguing. And before you call me an idealist, please tell me how continuously improving our own ideas with others' feedback isn't helpful.
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quote:Originally posted by Sa'eed: Victor Hanson Davis of the national review always drones about how today's poor don't have it so bad since they have access to big screen televisions and gadgets, which really misses the point that you can't really get much pleasure/utility out of such things if you're worried about feeding your kids or making rent and car payments.
"Gadgets." Yeah. Gadgets make life easier. And longer. Also they can improve your income, if you are so motivated.
For example: Most poor people in America have some access to the Internet. Which means, for example, that they could learn how to program. Rudimentary programming skills, regardless of education level, could easily lift them out of poverty
I don't think poor people have the access you think they do. As someone who works with low income teens, I can tell you many don't even have computers let alone net access. Most of them go to the library, but with funding cuts it means limited access. More people get net access from McDonalds than from libraries.
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And poor people eat lots of McDonald's. Cool. So they have net access.
Anyway, I by no means said every poor person has net access. Of course some don't... though they benefit from other advances in technology. But of those that do, I'd bet it's a significant percentage of, say, the bottom 20%.
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Why's that? I've been poor. And I've worked alongside people that were even poorer. It's not pleasant, but it's hardly hopeless.
Regardless, Lyr, did you miss the observations Mucus and I offered at the end of the previous page? They were relevant to your ideas about how adjusting for inflation is only part of the story.
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Definite what you mean by this. Note that there was a whole conversation last page about middle-class poor not being the same as *actually poor*.
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I'm just marveling at the idea that McDonald's is an authentic net access idea for poor people.
Can you upsize to a laptop or a personal computer? With your fries can you get 'let me sit here in silence so I can do classwork'?
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In Canada, Tim Horton's has gotten free wifi, so that might be authentic net access, and you don't need to buy a happy meal for it. Posts: 185 | Registered: Apr 2009
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quote:Originally posted by Dan_Frank: For example: Most poor people in America have some access to the Internet. Which means, for example, that they could learn how to program. Rudimentary programming skills, regardless of education level, could easily lift them out of poverty
I am trying to imagine my Dad (who, despite being a pretty smart guy, can't manage to retrieve his voice mail) learning how to program. You seriously overestimate how easy it is to learn even rudimentary programming skills past a certain age or below a certain education level. Especially if the only access you have to these skills is learning them from the internet.
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quote:Originally posted by Dan_Frank: For example: Most poor people in America have some access to the Internet. Which means, for example, that they could learn how to program. Rudimentary programming skills, regardless of education level, could easily lift them out of poverty
I am trying to imagine my Dad (who, despite being a pretty smart guy, can't manage to retrieve his voice mail) learning how to program. You seriously overestimate how easy it is to learn even rudimentary programming skills past a certain age or below a certain education level. Especially if the only access you have to these skills is learning them from the internet.
As someone that is trying to learn some basic programming from the net, you are absolutely correct. Only a few people would actually be able to do it.
That being said, there is something I need to point out. It seems like every time someone suggests a way to advance out of poverty on this site, they are immediately shot down by multiple people for this reason. But here's the problem, there is NO one size fits all way to success. Everyone is different, has different skills, abilities and desires. You can argue politics, policies, socioeconomics, culture, racism, etc. etc. all you want but there is no cure all. No, not many people have the ability to learn a marketable level of programming with no resources but internet access, but a few could. Just like some could start profitable small businesses. I see people go from nothing to something all the time through landscaping, courier services, housecleaning, cooking, tour guiding, fishing or other business ventures.
Which is the great thing about western society, people have the opportunity to advance. Some places and some times in history, this has been nearly impossible no matter how good or hard working you are. Still, such opportunities do seem to be in smaller supply than they should be. We need to find a way to create more such opportunities, even if only a few people would be able to take advantage of them. No one thing is going to help everybody but a thousand such new opportunities could. Instead of belittling people with good ideas, try encouraging them.
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quote:Originally posted by Dan_Frank: Why's that? I've been poor. And I've worked alongside people that were even poorer.
Doesn't matter. Whatever the reason, you keep talking about the impoverished as though their poverty is simply a compelling condition to raise their dice pool in immediately convenient postindustrial applications so that they can just not be poor again! by applying themselves!
The jump to this slightly bizarre tangent that was essentially 'so there you go! poor people eat lots of mcdonalds, and mcdonalds has wifi, so they could learn to program!' is just emblematic of that.
It's why earlier I observed of you that you keep acting and using language about the issue of cycles of poverty as if the economic exercise of poor families/people 'opting to be at least a little productive with their time' and thus learn how to not be impoverished is just in a disconnected vacuum from poverty and bodily needs, like it's levels in an economic MMO that you can pursue if you feel like it.
quote:It seems like every time someone suggests a way to advance out of poverty on this site, they are immediately shot down by multiple people for this reason.
governmental safety net and family support systems, universal healthcare, etc, are all readily proven time and time again to help elevate people out of poverty and greatly enhance class mobility and generally more than pay for themselves, so these ideas don't ever get shot down by me.
Problem is, they're SOCIALISMS. So some people must reject them on principle because having to accept that they are provably recognized to be beneficial in exactly these fields is not a concession people can make that does not undermine an entire house of socioeconomic belief system cards.
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quote:Originally posted by Raymond Arnold: >Why's that? I've been poor.
Definite what you mean by this. Note that there was a whole conversation last page about middle-class poor not being the same as *actually poor*.
Right. What's the point of this? To establish my credentials, or what? So you'll believe my authority? Probably not.
Whatever, though. It's not like it's a secret or something.
I mean that when I was a kid I got out of my parents house and moved to rural Arizona with no support network other than a couple friends. I worked a minimum wage job (there was no state minimum wage at the time, so I got the federal one). I couldn't afford my own place so I subletted a room in a house for cheap. I owed my parents money because I'd wrecked a car of theirs when I was a stupid kid. Probably didn't legally owe them, but I sent them money anyway until I'd paid the repairs. I bought a beyond-junker car that could get me to work for a couple hundred bucks. I played Tom's sucker's game of "working my way up" so I could get slightly above minimum wage, and I grabbed every possible extra shift I could. I worked weekends.
I saved. I bought my own insurance as soon as I could budget it, and that was good, because I had a major medical crisis after about two years at this.
Eventually I bought a new-to-me used car in good shape, a new computer, and later when I moved back to California I had enough savings to get a decent apartment (with roommates) and survive for quite a few months while I sorted out what I was going to do next.
There are some things I didn't do. I didn't have kids that I had no idea what to do with. I didn't go to college and rack up a mountain of debt. I didn't take out a mortgage I couldn't afford. I didn't run up a huge credit card bill buying expensive crap, or get in debt to a check cashing place.
I also didn't have my medical crisis, say, two years earlier, when I'd just moved out of my parents' place with literally nothing. That would've put me in the hole much worse. That was lucky. I'm not denying, and have never denied, that unfortunate shit happens to people that don't deserve it.
Anyway. There you go Raymond. Is that helpful in some way? I seriously doubt it.
quote:Originally posted by Samprimary: governmental safety net and family support systems, universal healthcare, etc, are all readily proven time and time again to help elevate people out of poverty and greatly enhance class mobility and generally more than pay for themselves, so these ideas don't ever get shot down by me.
Problem is, they're SOCIALISMS. So some people must reject them on principle because having to accept that they are provably recognized to be beneficial in exactly these fields is not a concession people can make that does not undermine an entire house of socioeconomic belief system cards. [/QB]
And where did I mention government policies? All those may very well be great things (and maybe not) but are not what I was talking about. I'm talking about the various things an individual can do on their own, safety nets or not.
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quote:Originally posted by Sa'eed: Victor Hanson Davis of the national review always drones about how today's poor don't have it so bad since they have access to big screen televisions and gadgets, which really misses the point that you can't really get much pleasure/utility out of such things if you're worried about feeding your kids or making rent and car payments.
"Gadgets." Yeah. Gadgets make life easier. And longer. Also they can improve your income, if you are so motivated.
For example: Most poor people in America have some access to the Internet. Which means, for example, that they could learn how to program. Rudimentary programming skills, regardless of education level, could easily lift them out of poverty
That's a callous view. Most people don't have the brains for computer programming. Like, do you expect the high school C and D students who had a lot of trouble with Algebra 2 to learn C++?
Even learning something as basic as a markup language would be a huge asset to a low skill worker.
Anyway, though... Is the problem that life is unfair for these people, or that they are doing badly? I don't really agree that being a D student in high school is reflective of one's ability to learn programming, but I do agree many people wouldn't be willing to spend the effort to learn these things. So?
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quote:Originally posted by Wingracer: Problem is, they're SOCIALISMS. So some people must reject them on principle because having to accept that they are provably recognized to be beneficial in exactly these fields is not a concession people can make that does not undermine an entire house of socioeconomic belief system cards.
And where did I mention government policies? All those may very well be great things (and maybe not) but are not what I was talking about. I'm talking about the various things an individual can do on their own, safety nets or not. [/QB][/QUOTE]
Ah, yeah. If I derailed from that inquiry, sorry.
The question of how to manage upward mobility, for so many people in this country, is a perplexing one. It can be doubly or triply complicated by stuff that the current system simply backdoors you for, like what effectively end up acting as 'outward markers of caste'
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I'm... honestly not entire sure how bad I should be feeling. On one hand, yes it's presumptuous to demand "show me your poverty credentials." It's certainly fair for you to be angry.
I totally agree with you about programming, btw. Anyone who *can* learn programming probably should, at least a little. But it is *not* something everyone can do.
But statements like "go to McDonalds are learn to program" do seem really out of touch. *I've* tried to work at McDonalds, and I generally am okay with breaking social norms, and I often feel profoundly uncomfortable with the manager staring at me and sometimes getting yelled at to leave. It certainly wouldn't be the place I could go every day to study for hours at a time.
It really does make a difference where you come from. "Raised in a middle class family and then left" isn't the same thing as "was born into poverty."
I spent the past few years hanging around incredibly ambitious people who treat it as normal to start companies and network their way to greatness. This *is* something many people could, in theory, do. But not having the social network that makes the option seem *real* is incredibly important.
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Little busy at the moment, but just to clarify, Raymond: I'm not angry with you in the slightest, and I don't think you should feel bad. I just don't think that telling my details will actually be helpful. I don't have any authority on being poor (no one does).
But yeah, didn't intend to give the impression that I'm angry with you. That's not the case. Posts: 3580 | Registered: Aug 2005
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