If you are poor, then living alone or taking on a lease is insane. The implicit assumption that you can't move and that "the rent" is as high as it is in this demo is untrue.
So what you end up with in this demo is a race against unsustainably high costs because you arbitrarily can't remove them.
Actually sounds pretty realistic to me. People tend not to have as much agency as we like to think.
"Just get a roommate" is not always an option. This applies to lots of other "obvious" solutions people like to come up with when it's not them.
It is not common in the US because there are aid programs for people with children that suffice to let them get private housing, and at the very least pay for their childrens food.
It's not an interesting "simulation" because it's effectively just stating that you can run your life into a corner if you don't pay attention.
I don't mean to put words in your mouth or assume what attitudes lie behind your personal thinking, I'm just reflecting on my own thoughts about this.
We might be able to move the bar, and that might be a good idea (welfare programs, etc), but that's all we can do, and there is clearly a point beyond which trying to rescue people is throwing good money after bad.
There is no way of preventing a human from damaging themselves in the general case (whether that damage be intentional or unintentional; I'm not moralizing here.).
For starters:
Lifting 20lb is not going to take a toll on your body unless your body is already beat to crap from something else.
Most people can replace a window. If you don't then you probably know someone who can. Poor people trade semi-skilled labor around as favors all the time.
You don't need to join a gym to stay in shape, especially if your job involves manual labor. You also don't need to stay in tip top physical shape, just don't let yourself get seriously out of shape.
Nobody is doing credit checks for lower end jobs or lower end housing. They care more about your criminal record or lack thereof. If your poor you're either not going to use credit or your credit will be crap. Good credit isn't going to help you dig a ditch or unload a truck so you'll get hired anyway.
The whole point of choosing housing on the rural end of the available options is to reduce the cost of living and not have someone siphon the gas out of your car. In the simulation the shopping selector reflects city prices and the crime happens anyway.
Doing laundry in a sink, tub or 5gal bucket is a perfectly fine option if your washer doesn't work. It also doesn't cost $30 to go to the laundromat. You don't just wear dirty clothes. That's what college kids who've never lived on their own and lose their laundry card do.
I get that the whole point of this game it to make a statement but it paints a picture that seriously undersells the resourcefulness of poor people. It's also very clear that the decision tree in this simulator was written using a set of assumptions about how certain problems be solved and those assumptions were either made in an ivory tower or were designed to mostly go unnoticed to those in ivory towers.
edit: Yes I have had jobs like this. I know exactly what they're like. I've been a janitor, I've worked in food-service, I've done under the table construction, I've worked for a temp agency. I've literally dug ditches and scrubbed toilets (not that bad on average, watch out for the edge cases though). If you expect me to have a lot of sympathy with people who lift 20lb in a 70deg warehouse then you will be disappointed. Yes it's a crappy job that pays poorly and I'm sure it's soul crushing but it's not the pyramid building slave labor that some people like to equate it to. The lack of advancement opportunities (advancement to better paying jobs) in some of these jobs are what I consider the primary reason that people in these jobs can't get out of poverty.
There’s a difference between lifting/carrying the occasional 20lb weight, and doing that continuously for 8 hours.
I used to have 8 hour shifts at a standing only checkout - it took about a month before my back started hurting continuously. This was just a standing on concrete job, not even lifting all day.
Low end housing does do credit checks, and does increase your “deposit”.
Several. I edited my original comment to reflect this.
>I used to have 8 hour shifts at a standing only checkout - it took about a month before my back started hurting continuously. This was just a standing on concrete job, not even lifting all day.
Not imagine it being hotter, louder higher humidity, and having to bend over slightly to reach things all the time. Welcome to a dishroom.
Just to be clear though
1. I said I got back pain just standing on concrete, without actually lifting anything
2. People are super bad at lifting things properly, so I’m sure a reasonable number of injuries are “avoidable”
3. I’m not saying that everything in this was realistic (there are some questionable options), just that this particular case is super plausible. After all the equivalent in tech is RSI/OOS (whatever it’s called now), and that’s super common even though avoiding it is way easier than avoiding back problems when your job is picking things up.
Sure. Now do it for 8 hours a day without air conditioning.