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The blindness of privilege:

> I paid for 90% of tuition/housing/living expenses by programming computers beginning in high school.

It's commendable that OP did this - that's great and plenty of people have squandered their gifts unlike him.

However, just because funding is available doesn't mean people aren't at a disadvantage due to their situation.

Does OP really believe that you're on equal ground if you:

- Live in a ghetto, often with an stressed-out, overworked single Mom.

- Go to a shit school without adequate fucking literacy education - let alone programming classes.

- Have no family / friends who have professional jobs.

- Often fear for your physical and financial safety.

- You don't have a computer / internet at home.

This breads a very difficult kind of scarcity to dig yourself out of, and we need programs to help these kids get out. Cash is great, but not sufficient.

You can't easily fix a broken culture from the outside. All people need to be treated equally, above all else, including race, gender, beliefs, and economic status (yes). I simply think it is unfair to nullify and demean the good work that hard-working individuals have done. By claiming that their position in life is a product of "privilege" or their parent's privilege, and simply giving those that did not do said hard work a free pass and cash.

Those are the beliefs, uncomfortable or not, and as is often the case with this type of topic, they are the products of a fundamentally different view of the world. I am not here to fix cosmic injustices using further injustice, nor do I want my tax money going towards it either.

Putting your ideological motivations aside, how do programs promoting home computer ownership or basic literacy (with the ultimate aim of getting people up to par in literacy, before encouraging development in the sciences) in impoverished areas "nullify and demean the good work that hard-working individuals have done"? There's no logical connection there, nor any sort of free pass being offered.

Furthermore, the implication that people in poverty are any less "hard-working" than those that have achieved financial success/accessibility to the sciences seems like a claim that needs some citations. Quick Google searches suggest that escaping poverty with children would actually require working more than 40-hours a week. Seems like a catch-22 for trying to achieve financial, familial and educational success. [1]

[1] http://blogs.wsj.com/economics/2015/05/06/u-s-minimum-wage-e...

Furthermore, the implication that people in poverty are any less "hard-working" than those that have achieved financial success/accessibility to the sciences seems like a claim that needs some citations

60% of poor adults (age 18-64) don't work at all. In contrast, 81% of non-poor adults do. 58% of non-poor adults worked full time year round, whereas only 11% of poor adults did.

http://www.census.gov/content/dam/Census/library/publication... Table 3 on page 21.

Why is this a remotely controversial claim, as opposed to simply standard knowledge that all educated people know? Would you also require a citation that proves Trump is a Republican, or that rich people don't commit much violent crime?

> > Furthermore, the implication that people in poverty are any less "hard-working" than those that have achieved financial success/accessibility to the sciences seems like a claim that needs some citations

> 60% of poor adults (age 18-64) don't work at all. In contrast, 81% of non-poor adults do.

I'm having trouble believing that it is possible to make an argument that % of people in a group who are employed is a good representation of the degree to which people in the group are hardworkers seriously, no matter what the group in question is.

But when its poor vs. non-poor -- that is, when the groups are divided up by an attribute which is fairly strongly influenced by whether or not you have the income derived from a job -- its even harder to believe.

> Why is this a remotely controversial claim, as opposed to simply standard knowledge that all educated people know?

That poor people are less likely to be employed is not a controversial claim, nor was it the claim at issue. That they are less "hard-working" was the claim at issue, which is not one which can be resolved by looking at the degree to which they are employed.

Here is data suggesting most poor people aren't looking for work - only 35% of poor adults were in the labor force: http://www.bls.gov/opub/reports/working-poor/archive/a-profi...

(To get that number, I took 10.5M in labor force / (45.3M poor people - 16M poor children).)

So yes, I think it's fair to characterize a group of people who don't work, and aren't even looking for work, as "less hard working" than a group that disproportionately is working.

What does "hard working" mean to you? And why do you believe poor people are comparably hard working to the non-poor?

> Here is data suggesting most poor people aren't looking for work - only 35% of poor adults were in the labor force:

Lower labor force participation could mean they are less hard working -- or it could mean that they have less opinion of their ability to be gainfully employed, or it could mean that working has a high cost (because, e.g., they have children to take care of, childcare isn't free, and the jobs they could reasonably secure wouldn't provide a net gain before considering child care that's enough to pay for childcare.)

Or lots of other things.

> What does "hard working" mean to you?

Willing to expend effort to improve one's condition, essentially.

> And why do you believe poor people are comparably hard working to the non-poor?

I haven't argued that they are. I've argued that the evidence that you've presented to prove that they are not has virtually no probative value on the point it is offered to support.

Willing to expend effort to improve one's condition, essentially.

It's true - I can't rule out that the poor aren't sitting at home praying for a job while taking no action to find one.

But what I've presented is strong evidence that the poor are not hard working.

Suppose your prior is P(!hardworking) = A, P(working) = B, P(looking for work) = C, P(hard work in non-labor force activities) = D. Of course, A + B + C + D must add up to 1.

I've just shown B and C to be false. So P(!hardworking|evidence I've presented) = A / (A + D) > A. Feel free to tweak this and try a more complicated model, I don't think you'll get a different result.

What evidence - if any - would cause you to acknowledge that the poor actually aren't hardworking?

(because, e.g., they have children to take care of, childcare isn't free, and the jobs they could reasonably secure wouldn't provide a net gain before considering child care that's enough to pay for childcare.)

Strangely, poor Indians have solved this problem. One poor person looks after multiple children while the others work. But poor Indians, unlike poor Americans, are actually hard working.

> Strangely, poor Indians have solved this problem. One poor person looks after multiple children while the others work

If done outside of the formal economy, that would produce, ceteris paribus, lower labor-force participation among the poor, which is, surprise-surprise, exactly the result you said indicated that American poor are not hard working.

So, thank you for illustrating one of the reasons your "evidence" doesn't justify the conclusion you've drawn from it.

It illustrates nothing of the sort. Some simple numbers.

Suppose that the 65% of poor adults who aren't in the labor force decided to enter into such an arrangement. Then 3 of them would work (or look for work) while the 4'th watched their children. The labor force participation rate of the poor would increase from 35% to 83.75%.

Can you name any piece of evidence or measurement which would cause you to believe the poor are not hardworking? Or is your doubt more religious in nature?

Your simple numbers are, frankly, meaningless and stupid. They assume that childcare is the only reason poor people are ever out of the labor force, for starters.

If you assume thatpoor people are more likely to have to resort to mutual aid outside the formal economy for that while non-poor people are more likely to be able to be either consumers or suppliers (or both) of childcare in the formal economy and that is the only factor affecting differences in labor force participation between the groups (which is, no doubt, an oversimplification), then you'd expect -- no matter what the mutual aid ratio is -- a lower labor force participation rate for the poor.

If you more generally assume that this is hardly unique, and that regulatory costs force those with less means out of the formal economy in other ways, you'd expect the labor force participation rate of the poor to be even further depressed.

> Can you name any piece of evidence or measurement which would cause you to believe the poor are not hardworking?

I'm not convinced that the character trait of "hard-workingness" has a good objectively-measurable proxy, but then since I'm not the one making a positive claim about it, its not my obligation to present and justify a valid measure of the trait.

> Or is your doubt more religious in nature?

False dichotomy much? Thinking you are making a positive fact claim about something for which no good objective evidence exists and which, while it might in principle be measurable, it is unlikely that objective evidence could exist in practice, isn't a "religious" objection -- if anything, its skepticism that you are making what is essentially a claim of a religious nature (that is, one that is held as true statement of material fact about the world without being either objectively justified nor even necessarily practically objectively justifiable.)

African-America men are incarcerated at a much higher rate than white men. Does that mean black men are more likely than white men to commit crimes?

The answer is no, because there are confounding issues I left out. This should sound familiar, you just did it yourself.

Yes, they probably do. Crime victimization surveys (e.g. the NCVS) strongly suggest that blacks do, in fact, commit a lot more violent crimes than other groups.

Here's a great blog post that reviews the academic literature: http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/11/25/race-and-justice-much-m...

Since you seem to believe there is some confounding factor that causes the census to incorrectly count the number of poor people who work, feel free to expand on it.

> I simply think it is unfair to nullify and demean the good work that hard-working individuals have done. By claiming that their position in life is a product of "privilege" or their parent's privilege, and simply giving those that did not do said hard work a free pass and cash.

And here it is - you think those who didn't have the same benefits as you and me (presumably) are takers who want "a free pass" and "cash".

What's missing in your diatribe is the fact that what everyone wants is opportunity or even a chance of opportunity. Not a handout - most people just want a fair break.

Does this article really concern people without 'adequate literacy'? They are not at a level they have to worry about university costs.

(Of course, their schools should be improved)

I'd rather spend the cash on the gifted students. Probably better return on investment.

While my HS did have a course in computer programming taught by a very good teacher, a computer scientist, I learned to program before then. These days one can purchase a Chromebook for about $200 to $300 and put Linux on that and program open source. I know someone who has a nice Mac, but actually I see him mostly with his 13" Chromebook programming C++ on Linux.

https://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss_2?url=search-alias%3...

Much of the issues mentioned are true of anyone that wants to go to college. But the article to me was about paying for college and ironically, the poor have more opportunities than the not so poor because of the Pell Grants and Stafford Loans.

At any rate, in NYC, I see students who were immigrants from disadvantaged backgrounds getting a top education at CUNY (and there are other low-cost schools in NYC).

It's not just cash and computing devices we are talking about. It's home environment. Home environment is a huge factor on education success.

My mother and sister both do some one on one tutoring of kindergarten age economically disadvantaged children. They've told me about the kids that come in that you can tell are very bright. But due to some of the factors like described in the previous post (eg the stressed out single mom who is always working and has less time to do things like reading with their kids etc., the less safe environment, or even just parents that for whatever reason don't know how to engage in that way), many times they still often come in significantly behind. Which makes sense. If your family actively engages their children in learning from the start, you're going to be better prepared.

Is it possible to overcome that? Yes, but not by simply throwing a Chromebook at them. The good news for instance is that this type of volunteer-led tutoring seems to work very decently at closing some of the gap (https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/can-volunteer...). So I think it's going to take more or less solutions in that direction.

I understanding what you are referring to but the point of the article was asking if people who come with low economic background are shut out of science research and the answer is no. True, there are some people with an unfortunate backgrounds in this country and every country, and it is great that people are helping them, but there are many who have little money including the immigrants that I mentioned, but those who are not immigrants as well and they are able to get science and engineering degrees at quality schools thanks to relatively low tuitions, and grants and government-based low-interest loans.

The Nature story is decidedly sensationalistic or the writer(s) didn't do their research. I think they should come to NYC and interview the students at CUNY and other NYC public colleges. Most of these students come from families without resources.

My junior/senior high school charged no tuition -- just fees and books. Entrance was based on grades/test scores/personal interview.

I did not grow up in NYC, but there are several free public high schools for gifted scientists and engineers to be including Stuyvesant High School and the Bronx School of Science. Entrance is based on merit.

So, it is certainly possible to get a top rated education not coming from "privilege." Other communities offer Magnet Schools and more should be offering them. A huge systemic problem in this country is that we spend enormous sums of money for "special education" but very little for academically gifted children. That is a real problem.

If one is concerned that children "without privilege" can get to be scientists and engineers and so on, then they should be solving a systems problem which is not enough public Magnet Schools for academically gifted children.

I didn't learn about FAFSA until I was already in my first year of college.

Navigating how to apply and pay for college is difficult if nobody you know has done it before.

The colleges hire people to help with financial aid and they are supposed to speak with students before classes start because of application deadlines.

I'm sorry that your college didn't help you as they should have.

You don't understand these arguments because you came from such an extreme place of class privilege that you already had the education in high school to get paid "programming" jobs. People coming from poverty don't have family that can make up the 10% that you didn't cover out of pocket. Even then, you are probably being disingenuous with that 90% figure and if you want it to stand as valid evidence that all of these dirty poors should just suck it up because, "BOOTSTRAPS!!!", you should share your financial records for the years that you were in college rather than throwing out a few general links.

You created something that, at first glance, seems like a reasonable argument, but when exposed to a cursory examination, collapses under the weight of it's own bullshit.

D-

> People coming from poverty don't have family that can make up the 10% that you didn't cover out of pocket

They get almost $24K free money in 4 years of free money in Pell Grants They get about $27K in 4 years subsidized Stafford Loans

People in poverty also get other kinds of grants/fellowships.

The Nature article was about people from poorer backgrounds not being able to be Scientists. The truth is they receive plenty of money for college and as I pointed out there are many in NYC that are doing just that.

Did you know that one of the schools that I went to disbursed financial aid a week after tuition was due, meaning that many students were dropped from their classes and had to re-register at the last minute with a late registration "fee?" This is one example of a constant parade of such bullshit. You had a pile of money that you earned, but it was predicated on an exceptionally privileged childhood education and a stratospherically privileged after-school-job opportunity, plus whatever else you needed, plus the knowledge that you could take risks because your family had the means to catch you if you stumbled. Did you know that many schools subtract the value of any grants or fellowships from what students receive in Pell grants and Stafford loans? Winning scholarships can be a Pyrrhic victory, but clearly you know all about that, because you are someone who received Pell or Stafford loans and actually understands the policy arena surrounding higher education financial assistance. Oh wait, you don't know what you are talking about and are instead trying to feed the meritocratic delusion upon which your self esteem rests.

> "Did you know that one of the schools that I went to disbursed financial aid a week after tuition was due ...."

You are saying that the school you went to was run incompetently. I am sorry for that. You should count yourself blessed that you received money for college without, say, serving in the military as others must do using a G.I. Bill to pay for college.

I could not get Pell Grants or Stafford Loans, if you'd read the entire thread with my posts, including my original post, you'd know that.

I wouldn't complain about any free money. So what if you win a scholarship and then the Pell Grants are deducted? 4 years of Pell Undergrad is a free $24 K. I didn't get a single penny.

I had no financial safety net that you suggest. I had to do it on my own.

So, people get Pell, they get Stafford, there are quality low-cost public schools such as City University of New York (CUNY) where Pell grants alone cover the cost of tuition.

In addition, people can serve in the military to get even more money through G.I. Bill (and many have).

After undergrad, PhD programs in science and engineering are funded including tuition and living expenses.

There are programs to pay for an entire medical school education including both tuition and living expenses such as serving 4 years as a military doctor (or perhaps other programs such as underserved areas).

Don't take your anger out on me or others because your school was incompetent for not processing grant and loan applications at the correct time. Instead be thankful for all of the free money received (Pell is now $24K for 4 years) and subsidized loans you got (Stafford is $27K for 4 years) subsidized by people like me that never could get either Pell or Stafford.