Thread: 1 In 7 In U.S. Lives Below Poverty Line

Originally Posted by JDJarvis

How do you imagine the situation of my parents was unique? Other then identifying and acting on a situation that couldn't be allowed to continue, what exactly did my parents and I have that others don't? An understanding of the value of productive work, recognizing the value of money, recognizing the value of skills and education?

Were those values instilled in him by his parents, by chance? Did he grow up in a house with books in it? Did he get 3 good meals every day? Perhaps your grandparents helped push him in the right direction.

[quote]To me exceptions indicate possibilities and how the poor aren't mired in poverty strictly because they started poor. [quote]

Easy to say when you are looking down from the ivory tower, isn't it? Not quite as easy when you're stuck down there trying to dig yourself out of it. Now add a couple of handicaps, say, darker skin, an accent, and a shitty set of "neighborhood schools" and that hurdle becomes all but unsurmountable.

Unfortunately, it seems that many cons want to keep it that way.

why shouldn't it be? Why should building a good life and strong family be easy?

:rolleyes:

We haven't managed to put more then a dent in poverty for decades now. We need different policies or all we are going to get is more of the same.

Not arguing for more of the same.

How about not living in single parent households? Sharing the workload with a partner goes a long way. I was a single parent for a few years, I know how hard it is, I managed thanks to help of friends and family and a career that paid well. We shared our skills and time to help each other achieve.

Again, easy from that ivory tower. You had family to support you. Great if you've got it. But when you don't?

The poor stay the poor if all they get is enough funds and support to stay poor.

Agreed. Real help needs to be provided - skill training. Life training. Real education. Real food that provides good nutrition to poor children in school, including breakfast, lunch, and a late afternoon dinner. Cleaning up of our cities to remove lead paint (a horrible developmental delayer for the poor who live in those old houses with all that lead) and other toxins that are delaying and disabling the poor children.

It's great to say "pull yourself up by your bootstraps." It's something else to grease those bootstraps and then look down at someone when their hands slip.

Originally Posted by lutherf

So your take is that poverty comes from not making as much money as other people? GENIUS!!

Yea, it's called wage stagnation. In 1950 median incomes were 2/3 that of median home values, in 2000 median incomes were less than 1/2 that of median home values.

People, including myself, have had to borrow more to buy a house, because wages haven't kept pace with home values.

Employers have shifted their wage costs increasingly to the top executives enjoying record profits, while the average worker's wages have remained the same or gone down.

In fact, median income has been dropping since 1997 when you use 2001 dollars.

Home Values

Median Income

Originally Posted by Angry American

Republicans want to eliminate regulation, the minimum wage, public education, medicare, medicaid, and welfare of any kind (unless of course you're rich, or a corporation.) These tenants in and of themselves only work against the poor and the working classes. We're in a race to the bottom, 3rd world here we come....

Hyperbolic bullshit. Get ahold of yourself man.

Have Republicans done any of that?

What we have here folks, is a classic case of fear mongering. I don't think it's gonna work this time.

Originally Posted by countryboy

Hyperbolic bullshit. Get ahold of yourself man.

Have Republicans done any of that?

What we have here folks, is a classic case of fear mongering. I don't think it's gonna work this time.

Hey, that's just what they're saying they'd like to do, on the campaign trail.

What we have here folks, is a classic case of denial. It seems to be common place these days.

Originally Posted by Angry American

Hey, that's just what they're saying they'd like to do, on the campaign trail.

Examples please.

What we have here folks, is a classic case of denial. It seems to be common place these days.

Touche.

Originally Posted by countryboy

Examples please.

Gladly, when I get home from work, have to take the kids to school ...

In the mean time you could educate yourself, it's all out there.

Originally Posted by Angry American

Gladly, when I get home from work, have to take the kids to school ...

In the mean time you could educate yourself, it's all out there.

I gotta get to work as well, we'll "spar" later.

Enjoy your kids while you can, they grow up fast buddy.

Originally Posted by pramjockey

Were those values instilled in him by his parents, by chance? Did he grow up in a house with books in it? Did he get 3 good meals every day? Perhaps your grandparents helped push him in the right direction.

I'm sure they did. I myself virtually haunted the public library. My parents would buy me overstocked college text books for me to read as a child, it was an inexpensive way to get me books on science and history that were better then what they had in the local library.

Easy to say when you are looking down from the ivory tower, isn't it?

Ivory tower? My home is less then 900 sq ft., 5 of us live here. We have two bedrooms (the wife and I sleep on a three season porch). Our household has 1 auto. We have one small window unit air conditioner and one bathroom. We live like we do now to have a better life tomorrow. We do have 4 computers and a hell of a lot of books.

Not quite as easy when you're stuck down there trying to dig yourself out of it.

I've had to stand in the supermarket and maker the decision between purchasing diapers and toilet paper. (When we couldn't afford a second hand washing machine yet). I've skipped a meal a day to make sure my kids and wife had enough. I'm very aware of being stuck and digging myself out.

Now add a couple of handicaps, say, darker skin, an accent, and a shitty set of "neighborhood schools" and that hurdle becomes all but unsurmountable.

Had the accent (born outside the U.S.) and for some rather curious reason my wife's family has an inherited disease you only see in African Americans (hmmmm I wonder why that would be?). My early elementary years were in a lower income satellite city of Boston and the education (not the environment) there was superior to that I had access to later when my parents got a house in semi-rural suburbia.

Yet I was still lucky as to where I lived. Being so close to Boston I'd skip school and go to museums and theaters. I did take advantage of community training programs and became a certified video producer before I was 13 years old. I managed to get enrolled in a summer theater program and was earning money as an instructor myself before I was out of middle school. Those programs often had room for more students, for some reason they didn't turn up.

Again, easy from that ivory tower. You had family to support you. Great if you've got it. But when you don't?

Having a family that acts like a family isn't an "ivory tower" it's how people are supposed to live.

When you don't have a family that can be there for you then you do it yourself. Yes you take advantage of any element you can but it should be to better your lot not accept and settle at a bare minimum.

Agreed. Real help needs to be provided - skill training. Life training. Real education. Real food that provides good nutrition to poor children in school, including breakfast, lunch, and a late afternoon dinner.

Most of the so called "welfare families" I grew up with had color t.v. sets and ate just fine. It's easy to save a few bucks when the government is paying for the kids breakfast and lunch.

There is is a curious issue these days where some families have a color t.v. and cable television and a video game system but no dinner table. Why have people forgot how to live? Why are lower income folks more often smokers and where do they get the money to do so? People are willing to opiate themselves over improving themselves.
The root is the family has been devalued and even usurped in our modern society where families are scattered and folks are told to fear their neighbors. We do have the ability to build our own families and be a part of our communities without the government invading our living rooms and bedrooms.
When I was a single parent I had my parents that didn't live too far off and a lesbian couple with a daughter the same age as my kids and that was my family. The couple would help watch my kids when my parents couldn't and I'd watch their daughter so they could go to school and training (one is still working to be a nurse, the other is trained pipe-fitter) and that was my family.
Want to see poor? Try being two young homosexual women with a child. Those two have had help but made the decision themselves to put in the hard work to better their lives (and the lives of others). We are only victim's of our circumstances if we choose to identify ourselves as so and to stay that way.

It's great to say "pull yourself up by your bootstraps." It's something else to grease those bootstraps and then look down at someone when their hands slip.

It's also something to be there to help people to give them a lift up or throw out a hand to help them. That's why I've helped at soup kitchen's and a nearby battered women's shelter. Everyone should be willing and able to help other people as they are capable and willing, not as they are forced and mandated to do so. That's why my family has extended outside my bloodline and the walls of my small house, I've chosen to strive to make my life better and help others do the same.

Originally Posted by JDJarvis

I'm sure they did. I myself virtually haunted the public library. My parents would buy me overstocked college text books for me to read as a child, it was an inexpensive way to get me books on science and history that were better then what they had in the local library.



Ivory tower? My home is less then 900 sq ft., 5 of us live here. We have two bedrooms (the wife and I sleep on a three season porch). Our household has 1 auto. We have one small window unit air conditioner and one bathroom. We live like we do now to have a better life tomorrow. We do have 4 computers and a hell of a lot of books.


I've had to stand in the supermarket and maker the decision between purchasing diapers and toilet paper. (When we couldn't afford a second hand washing machine yet). I've skipped a meal a day to make sure my kids and wife had enough. I'm very aware of being stuck and digging myself out.



Had the accent (born outside the U.S.) and for some rather curious reason my wife's family has an inherited disease you only see in African Americans (hmmmm I wonder why that would be?). My early elementary years were in a lower income satellite city of Boston and the education (not the environment) there was superior to that I had access to later when my parents got a house in semi-rural suburbia.

Yet I was still lucky as to where I lived. Being so close to Boston I'd skip school and go to museums and theaters. I did take advantage of community training programs and became a certified video producer before I was 13 years old. I managed to get enrolled in a summer theater program and was earning money as an instructor myself before I was out of middle school. Those programs often had room for more students, for some reason they didn't turn up.



Having a family that acts like a family isn't an "ivory tower" it's how people are supposed to live.

When you don't have a family that can be there for you then you do it yourself. Yes you take advantage of any element you can but it should be to better your lot not accept and settle at a bare minimum.


Most of the so called "welfare families" I grew up with had color t.v. sets and ate just fine. It's easy to save a few bucks when the government is paying for the kids breakfast and lunch.

There is is a curious issue these days where some families have a color t.v. and cable television and a video game system but no dinner table. Why have people forgot how to live? Why are lower income folks more often smokers and where do they get the money to do so? People are willing to opiate themselves over improving themselves.
The root is the family has been devalued and even usurped in our modern society where families are scattered and folks are told to fear their neighbors. We do have the ability to build our own families and be a part of our communities without the government invading our living rooms and bedrooms.
When I was a single parent I had my parents that didn't live too far off and a lesbian couple with a daughter the same age as my kids and that was my family. The couple would help watch my kids when my parents couldn't and I'd watch their daughter so they could go to school and training (one is still working to be a nurse, the other is trained pipe-fitter) and that was my family.
Want to see poor? Try being two young homosexual women with a child. Those two have had help but made the decision themselves to put in the hard work to better their lives (and the lives of others). We are only victim's of our circumstances if we choose to identify ourselves as so and to stay that way.



It's also something to be there to help people to give them a lift up or throw out a hand to help them. That's why I've helped at soup kitchen's and a nearby battered women's shelter. Everyone should be willing and able to help other people as they are capable and willing, not as they are forced and mandated to do so. That's why my family has extended outside my bloodline and the walls of my small house, I've chosen to strive to make my life better and help others do the same.

I know a guy who worked at battered women shelters to find dates!

Originally Posted by Sunshine

I know a guy who worked at battered women shelters to find dates!

What the fuck?

Originally Posted by countryboy

Hyperbolic bullshit. Get ahold of yourself man.

Have Republicans done any of that?

What we have here folks, is a classic case of fear mongering. I don't think it's gonna work this time.

For starters, Republicans have been against these things for decades, and whenever they've had the power, they've done their best to either curtail them, repeal them, or run them so poorly that they are no longer effective.

Here are a few examples of the intent of Republicans:

1) Republicans proposed the repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act, and won.

2) Ronald Reagan made a campaign promise to abolish the Department of Education.

3) Abolishing the Department of Education was part of the Republican Party platform during Bob Dole's presidential campaign.

4) Republicans have had their eye on Medicare for years, seeing money for Medicare as money they could give away in tax cuts.

5) Republicans have led the drive to privatize both Medicare and Social Security.

6) Republicans oppose raises to the minimum wage at virtually every turn (though they usually end up supporting it).

7) Republican John Raese of West Virginia would like to abolish the minimum wage.

All you have to do is look at history to see that what I said is self evident. Sure they may not carry out all of their threats, but it is their intent.

You want to talk about "killing" grandma, then talk about Republicans wanting to take away her Social Security and Medicare.

Originally Posted by Angry American

For starters, Republicans have been against these things for decades, and whenever they've had the power, they've done their best to either curtail them, repeal them, or run them so poorly that they are no longer effective.

Here are a few examples of the intent of Republicans:

1) Republicans proposed the repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act, and won.

2) Ronald Reagan made a campaign promise to abolish the Department of Education.

3) Abolishing the Department of Education was part of the Republican Party platform during Bob Dole's presidential campaign.

4) Republicans have had their eye on Medicare for years, seeing money for Medicare as money they could give away in tax cuts.

5) Republicans have led the drive to privatize both Medicare and Social Security.

6) Republicans oppose raises to the minimum wage at virtually every turn (though they usually end up supporting it).

7) Republican John Raese of West Virginia would like to abolish the minimum wage.

All you have to do is look at history to see that what I said is self evident. Sure they may not carry out all of their threats, but it is their intent.

You want to talk about "killing" grandma, then talk about Republicans wanting to take away her Social Security and Medicare.

Yes, when I look at this Nation today, all I see are failed Republican policies. Offshoring, deregulations as to allow for the last crash, not taxing to pay for two wars, the list is quite large. Isn't it coincidental that once the Repubs got back into power, this Nation went into the shitter? The glory days of Democratic rule of post WW2 America, the expoential growth in the middle class, the availability of factory jobs that created a huge middle class, was gutted by these jackwag Repubicans. The fruits of their labor is easily seen on any American city and town with all of the industrial bases GONE. Not to mention how the rich have gotten richer, at the expense of everyone else. This is what Republicans bring to the table.

Yet, some of us still have not suffered enough from these jackwags, but fear not! A new dose is being prepared as we speak. And this next dose may very well do even you in.

Originally Posted by Blue Doggy

Yes, when I look at this Nation today, all I see are failed Republican policies. Offshoring, deregulations as to allow for the last crash, not taxing to pay for two wars, the list is quite large. Isn't it coincidental that once the Repubs got back into power, this Nation went into the shitter? The glory days of Democratic rule of post WW2 America, the expoential growth in the middle class, the availability of factory jobs that created a huge middle class, was gutted by these jackwag Repubicans. The fruits of their labor is easily seen on any American city and town with all of the industrial bases GONE. Not to mention how the rich have gotten richer, at the expense of everyone else. This is what Republicans bring to the table.

Yet, some of us still have not suffered enough from these jackwags, but fear not! A new dose is being prepared as we speak. And this next dose may very well do even you in.

Actually it started going in the shitter when Democrats got back control of the one branch of government that does control things.

Congress.

Carry on with your rant in the face of the evidence though.