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> I wonder why folks who start with roughly the same skills, intelligence and opportunities (and bank account balance!) can nevertheless end up in very differen

> I wonder why folks who start with roughly the same skills, intelligence and opportunities (and bank account balance!) can nevertheless end up in very different places? I actually think a lot of it comes down to self control. Can you resist the allure of consumerism and keeping up with the Joneses? Are you buying liabilities that actually make your life harder? Are you living outside of your means? IMO it matters little how much you earn if you don't know how to spend it.

rectang 10mo ago
From the article: > Being poor is you already did all those things. You cancelled all your streaming services years ago. You make all your food from scratch all the time. You never go to fucking Starbucks. You fix everything yourself. You already stretch everything to the limit. That is how you have to live every day of your life, for eternity, with no relief in sight.
- bigstrat2003 10mo ago
  Yes, the article says that, but I have direct experience which says the article is not telling the whole story. Some people are making all the right decisions and are still poor due to bad luck trapping them in a cycle of financial ruin. But also, some people really are poor due to their own crappy decisions. I've known them! They exist and must be accounted for in any productive discussion about poverty. Many, many people try to act like only one of these two groups of poor people exists. For some people, that means they claim that if you're poor it's only because of your own bad decisions. For some people (including, to be frank, most of the commenters in this thread), it means they claim that if you're poor it's only because of systemic issues. Both claims are wrong, however, and both hamper us from finding effective solutions. Whether one is poor due to external causes or their own bad decisions, they deserve to be treated with compassion and for us to try to help them. But the solutions for those two failure modes look very different and helping one group isn't going to do anything to help the other. Thus, trying to effectively solve problems of poverty in our society must include a balanced view, recognizing that both causes of poverty (systemic issues and bad personal decision making) are quite real.
- Jensson 10mo ago
  > Being poor is you already did all those things. ... You make all your food from scratch all the time. If poor americans did this they wouldn't be so fat, so that is wrong. Food stamps lets the poor eat unhealthily even though they are poor, while most of the world poor means you have to make your own and not get all the industrial crap. The other interpretation is that people who don't make their own food aren't really poor, which would mean there are barely any poor Americans. But I doubt that is what they mean.
  - jandrewrogers 10mo ago
    You can definitely be fat making food from scratch. Making it from scratch doesn't mean it is low calorie. See also: southern home cooking.
    - Jensson 10mo ago
      Yes, there were always fat people around in history, but not at the same rates and severity as modern Americans. Cooking your own food reduces how fat you are on average, American poors wouldn't be one of the fattest groups in the world if they made their own food.
    - 9rx 10mo ago
      I suppose that depends on what you mean by "from scratch". If first you must invent the universe, starvation is certain. If you have to produce the food from the ground by yourself, you will struggle to scrape enough calories out of it to survive. There is no hope of excessive weight gain here. If "from scratch" means going to the grocery store to buy a bunch of prepared ingredients that you go home with to mix up in a bowl, sure. Then it starts to become much easier. Where does the line get drawn?
      - simoncion 10mo ago
        > There is no hope of excessive weight gain here. Uh. We can pretty confidently say that ancient civilizations had fat folks, too. Also, butter, processed animal fats (such as lard), fatty meats... none of these are recent inventions, and they're all good at helping you to grow fat. I feel very confident in claiming that they (or things functionally just like them) have been around for a thousand years, and I expect that they've been around for several thousand.
- 9rx 10mo ago
  > You make all your food from scratch all the time. [...] You fix everything yourself. What stands out here is that if someone finds out that you can cook or fix things in my circles, they'll be knocking at your door trying to throw money at you. These are hotly desired skills. Of course, it is conceivable that if your circle is other poor people that can't offer you a good job, you'll never find those opportunities. Does this suggest that the company you keep is most signifiant? That is certainly not a new idea. Being able to hobnob with the world's richest billionaires is probably a function of luck more than anything. But what about the moms and pops that are found everywhere? Is getting into their good graces also limited by sheer luck, or does self-control start to dominate?
  - s5300 10mo ago
    [dead]
blizdiddy 10mo ago
[flagged]
- webdood90 10mo ago
  > I wonder why folks who start with roughly the same skills, intelligence and opportunities (and bank account balance!) can nevertheless end up in very different places? I am answering this question. Perhaps you could reply with something useful instead of attacking my comment.
  - blizdiddy 10mo ago
    You should feel embarrassed for “thinking” so callously and uncritically. Do you need everything handed to you? Family issues, natural disasters, medical events, house fires, abuse, wage theft, fate. I’ve worked with the destitute, there is no safety net.
    - webdood90 10mo ago
      I'm not disputing those things happen or that luck plays a big part. I'm commenting on what people have control over. I'm not sure what is compelling you to be so rude to a complete stranger on the internet. I'm here to discuss, have my ideas challenged, and learn.
      - blizdiddy 10mo ago
        Poor people don’t have control of their situation. You are literally victim blaming and surprised that rubs people the wrong way. Victim blaming is rude, offering your flippant two cents is rude. There, your ideas are challenged, rather than tone police go think about it.
        lurking_swe 10mo ago
        suggestion: give people the benefit of the doubt instead of assuming they are out to get you, trying to blame you, or trying to attack you. Especially on hacker news. Was it a “dumb” question? Yes. Maybe they are dumb. Maybe they are just totally out of touch because they don’t know any poor people. I don’t know because i’m not a mind reader. It’s not a crime to ask a dumb question. Good day.
sgarland 10mo ago
I don’t think you understand how little some people have. Especially in rural (or really, anything that isn’t urban) areas, where you have to have a car for transportation, because public transit doesn’t exist. Keeping an old car running and insured isn’t cheap.
- 9rx 10mo ago
  > Especially in rural (or really, anything that isn’t urban) areas What isn't urban but also not rural? I've seen disagreement over exactly where urban begins. A density of ~400 people per km², with a minimum of 1-2,000 people is a common definition, although the OECD targets a density of 1,500 people per km², with a minimum of 7,000 people, to capture all the variation throughout the nations it tracks. Regardless, in all those cases "rural" always encompasses that which falls short of what constitutes urban. I've never heard of this alternate state you speak of.
  - simoncion 10mo ago
    > What isn't urban but also not rural? The sub-urban regions. All the suburbs I've been in (and I'd wager nearly all of the US suburbs in existence) require you to have a vehicle to go about your day... unless you work from home and have everything delivered to you, I guess.
    - 9rx 10mo ago
      The particular urban subset that you speak of that is also literally named as such is still within the urban set, so that's clearly not it.
      - simoncion 10mo ago
        It's true that the word 'urban' is a substring match for the word 'suburban'. You're right about that.
        9rx 10mo ago
thewebguyd 10mo ago
What consumerism? Someone falling into the "poor" category the OP describes has already forgone all of that out of necessity. There is no money for consumerism. Has nothing to do with self control and "maybe don't go buy a coffee." They weren't doing that in the first place. There are places in this country where the minimum wage is still a paltry $10/hour or less and rent for a family is $2800+. The math doesn't work. There's a systemic affordability problem
- webdood90 10mo ago
  Is the discussion about only one particular kind of poor person? The system is a trap to keep people poor. A lot of people make the wrong decisions that keep them there. Can we not talk about that? It doesn't belittle the subset of folks that it doesn't apply to. I grew up this way and saw it first-hand. A dead-beat step dad who didn't work for literally _years_. A mother with the only income of less than $40k/year for 3. Cigarettes and beer every night. Fancy, financed cars with ridiculous interest rates because their credit scores were shit. Rent-a-center furniture payments. The newest phones and other bullshit that they couldn't truly afford. So many people in our circles lived this way or worse. And I'm not trying to come forward and say "I got out of it so everyone can!" - just that people have a small amount of control and they regularly make the wrong decisions.
  - thewebguyd 10mo ago
    > Is the discussion about only one particular kind of poor person? Yes, according to the OP. The article already describes the people you are talking about as "broke," not "poor." We already know that those in the broke category can, in most cases, make better decisions and reduce their spending and possibly get ahead. The ones not in that category can't, which is who the article is about. The discussion is how do we address and help eliminate poverty, not how do we help educate people who are broke because they make bad choices.
    - webdood90 10mo ago
      I think that's a fair point.

rectang 10mo ago

From the article: > Being poor is you already did all those things. You cancelled all your streaming services years ago. You make all your food from scratch all the time. You never go to fucking Starbucks. You fix everything yourself. You already stretch everything to the limit. That is how you have to live every day of your life, for eternity, with no relief in sight.

bigstrat2003 10mo ago
Yes, the article says that, but I have direct experience which says the article is not telling the whole story. Some people are making all the right decisions and are still poor due to bad luck trapping them in a cycle of financial ruin. But also, some people really are poor due to their own crappy decisions. I've known them! They exist and must be accounted for in any productive discussion about poverty. Many, many people try to act like only one of these two groups of poor people exists. For some people, that means they claim that if you're poor it's only because of your own bad decisions. For some people (including, to be frank, most of the commenters in this thread), it means they claim that if you're poor it's only because of systemic issues. Both claims are wrong, however, and both hamper us from finding effective solutions. Whether one is poor due to external causes or their own bad decisions, they deserve to be treated with compassion and for us to try to help them. But the solutions for those two failure modes look very different and helping one group isn't going to do anything to help the other. Thus, trying to effectively solve problems of poverty in our society must include a balanced view, recognizing that both causes of poverty (systemic issues and bad personal decision making) are quite real.
Jensson 10mo ago
> Being poor is you already did all those things. ... You make all your food from scratch all the time. If poor americans did this they wouldn't be so fat, so that is wrong. Food stamps lets the poor eat unhealthily even though they are poor, while most of the world poor means you have to make your own and not get all the industrial crap. The other interpretation is that people who don't make their own food aren't really poor, which would mean there are barely any poor Americans. But I doubt that is what they mean.
- jandrewrogers 10mo ago
  You can definitely be fat making food from scratch. Making it from scratch doesn't mean it is low calorie. See also: southern home cooking.
  - Jensson 10mo ago
    Yes, there were always fat people around in history, but not at the same rates and severity as modern Americans. Cooking your own food reduces how fat you are on average, American poors wouldn't be one of the fattest groups in the world if they made their own food.
  - 9rx 10mo ago
    I suppose that depends on what you mean by "from scratch". If first you must invent the universe, starvation is certain. If you have to produce the food from the ground by yourself, you will struggle to scrape enough calories out of it to survive. There is no hope of excessive weight gain here. If "from scratch" means going to the grocery store to buy a bunch of prepared ingredients that you go home with to mix up in a bowl, sure. Then it starts to become much easier. Where does the line get drawn?
    - simoncion 10mo ago
      > There is no hope of excessive weight gain here. Uh. We can pretty confidently say that ancient civilizations had fat folks, too. Also, butter, processed animal fats (such as lard), fatty meats... none of these are recent inventions, and they're all good at helping you to grow fat. I feel very confident in claiming that they (or things functionally just like them) have been around for a thousand years, and I expect that they've been around for several thousand.
9rx 10mo ago
> You make all your food from scratch all the time. [...] You fix everything yourself. What stands out here is that if someone finds out that you can cook or fix things in my circles, they'll be knocking at your door trying to throw money at you. These are hotly desired skills. Of course, it is conceivable that if your circle is other poor people that can't offer you a good job, you'll never find those opportunities. Does this suggest that the company you keep is most signifiant? That is certainly not a new idea. Being able to hobnob with the world's richest billionaires is probably a function of luck more than anything. But what about the moms and pops that are found everywhere? Is getting into their good graces also limited by sheer luck, or does self-control start to dominate?
- s5300 10mo ago
  [dead]

blizdiddy 10mo ago

[flagged]

webdood90 10mo ago
> I wonder why folks who start with roughly the same skills, intelligence and opportunities (and bank account balance!) can nevertheless end up in very different places? I am answering this question. Perhaps you could reply with something useful instead of attacking my comment.
- blizdiddy 10mo ago
  You should feel embarrassed for “thinking” so callously and uncritically. Do you need everything handed to you? Family issues, natural disasters, medical events, house fires, abuse, wage theft, fate. I’ve worked with the destitute, there is no safety net.
  - webdood90 10mo ago
    I'm not disputing those things happen or that luck plays a big part. I'm commenting on what people have control over. I'm not sure what is compelling you to be so rude to a complete stranger on the internet. I'm here to discuss, have my ideas challenged, and learn.
    - blizdiddy 10mo ago
      Poor people don’t have control of their situation. You are literally victim blaming and surprised that rubs people the wrong way. Victim blaming is rude, offering your flippant two cents is rude. There, your ideas are challenged, rather than tone police go think about it.
      - lurking_swe 10mo ago
        suggestion: give people the benefit of the doubt instead of assuming they are out to get you, trying to blame you, or trying to attack you. Especially on hacker news. Was it a “dumb” question? Yes. Maybe they are dumb. Maybe they are just totally out of touch because they don’t know any poor people. I don’t know because i’m not a mind reader. It’s not a crime to ask a dumb question. Good day.

sgarland 10mo ago

I don’t think you understand how little some people have. Especially in rural (or really, anything that isn’t urban) areas, where you have to have a car for transportation, because public transit doesn’t exist. Keeping an old car running and insured isn’t cheap.

9rx 10mo ago
> Especially in rural (or really, anything that isn’t urban) areas What isn't urban but also not rural? I've seen disagreement over exactly where urban begins. A density of ~400 people per km², with a minimum of 1-2,000 people is a common definition, although the OECD targets a density of 1,500 people per km², with a minimum of 7,000 people, to capture all the variation throughout the nations it tracks. Regardless, in all those cases "rural" always encompasses that which falls short of what constitutes urban. I've never heard of this alternate state you speak of.
- simoncion 10mo ago
  > What isn't urban but also not rural? The sub-urban regions. All the suburbs I've been in (and I'd wager nearly all of the US suburbs in existence) require you to have a vehicle to go about your day... unless you work from home and have everything delivered to you, I guess.
  - 9rx 10mo ago
    The particular urban subset that you speak of that is also literally named as such is still within the urban set, so that's clearly not it.
    - simoncion 10mo ago
      It's true that the word 'urban' is a substring match for the word 'suburban'. You're right about that.
      - 9rx 10mo ago

thewebguyd 10mo ago

What consumerism? Someone falling into the "poor" category the OP describes has already forgone all of that out of necessity. There is no money for consumerism. Has nothing to do with self control and "maybe don't go buy a coffee." They weren't doing that in the first place. There are places in this country where the minimum wage is still a paltry $10/hour or less and rent for a family is $2800+. The math doesn't work. There's a systemic affordability problem

webdood90 10mo ago
Is the discussion about only one particular kind of poor person? The system is a trap to keep people poor. A lot of people make the wrong decisions that keep them there. Can we not talk about that? It doesn't belittle the subset of folks that it doesn't apply to. I grew up this way and saw it first-hand. A dead-beat step dad who didn't work for literally _years_. A mother with the only income of less than $40k/year for 3. Cigarettes and beer every night. Fancy, financed cars with ridiculous interest rates because their credit scores were shit. Rent-a-center furniture payments. The newest phones and other bullshit that they couldn't truly afford. So many people in our circles lived this way or worse. And I'm not trying to come forward and say "I got out of it so everyone can!" - just that people have a small amount of control and they regularly make the wrong decisions.
- thewebguyd 10mo ago
  > Is the discussion about only one particular kind of poor person? Yes, according to the OP. The article already describes the people you are talking about as "broke," not "poor." We already know that those in the broke category can, in most cases, make better decisions and reduce their spending and possibly get ahead. The ones not in that category can't, which is who the article is about. The discussion is how do we address and help eliminate poverty, not how do we help educate people who are broke because they make bad choices.
  - webdood90 10mo ago
    I think that's a fair point.