Comment by ailideex | Hacker News Reader

Comment by ailideex | Hacker News Reader

Parent Full thread

> In discussions about low income families I often see somebody comment along the lines of blaming the parents for making bad choices and choosing to have children they couldn't afford/care for/want.

So just to be clear on some points before I get accused of holding positions I do not hold. I am all for helping children who were let down by their parents. I don't think they should be condemned. I also grew up very poor, my parents had to go into debt to buy basic necessities and I still have to support my parents financially and will likely always have to do this.

When it comes to this issue, you need to pick a lane and stay in it. Either people have agency and are responsible for their actions and ultimate responsibility lays with the parents - or people do not have agency and nobody is responsible for anything and concepts like democracy makes no sense.

I personally pick the lane that people do have agency and do bear ultimate responsibility for their actions. I do make exception for those who are severely mentally ill but this is not the root of poverty.

Consequently, while social support for those who were let down by their parents is good - this alone cannot fix all problems. Maybe in a place like Norway with very low unemployment it is enough, but it will never be able solve the problems in places like South Africa where the unemployment is ~30% (calculated in the same way as unemployment reported for US and EU economies is calculated).

So sure, lets help the children - but lets stop making excuses for those who put the children in that position to begin with. I don't think it is okay to run cover for absolutely horrible human beings who bring children into this world that they cannot adequately provide for.

  Either people have agency  ...

Or things are more nuanced than this view allows. What if people in general have some agency, but not always enough to counteract the larger scale actions that affect them?

> What if people in general have some agency, but not always enough to counteract the larger scale actions that affect them?

Would one of those actions be the urge to have sex? If not then not sure what we are talking about here.

I think the majority of people who have children they can't provide for bear the responsibility for that and I don't really see where in that you want to plug your nuance - but if you have something more than "there is nuance" I would love to hear it.

Your are assuming at least two things (there are surely more) about people who are struggling to raise kids

1) They have always been struggling, a didn't have a reasonable plan originally, and/or

2) They didn't take reasonable precautions to avoid pregnancy but still end up pregnant, and believe their best option was to raise the child

Both of these assumptions are clearly false in general although I don't know enough about the issues to hesitate a guess on percentages.

I was mostly thinking about (1). Someone with a partner and a solid household income can easily become a struggling single parent, for example, without having made any obviously bad decisions.

I think we completely rule out cases where people were in a good financial position and could provide for children and cases where people were using birth control child poverty will remain virtually unchanged.

https://www.businessinsider.com/parents-determine-child-succ...

> The researchers further suggest that the "fraction of children living in single-parent households is the strongest correlation of upward income mobility among all the variables we explored."

See also: https://www.nationalreview.com/2018/02/single-mothers-new-yo...

It's a complicated issue. I don't know enough to have a strong opinion on it, but I do know enough to know that a lot of the research is contentious.

The black/white thinking espoused above, though: I doubt it leads to real insight or improvements.

It is very easy to point at a poor person and make up a random reason why they are poor. (It's not like anyone will spend resources on validating your claim.)

It is very difficult to look at a random average person and predict whether they will become poor within the next 2 decades.

This is a good point. Many aspects of our lives are under the control of others & our socio-economic system. Recessions our previously comfortable families below the breadline, where they are then judged harshly for their life choices. Many families are only a crisis or two away from homelessness, without full agency to rescue themselves.

>When it comes to this issue, you need to pick a lane and stay in it

This is a good example where black and white thinking is dangerous. Some people have more control over their circumstances than others. That includes parents providing (or not) for their children. You don't need to be an apologist for bad parenting to acknowledge that human circumstances are due to some combination of choices, intrinsic nature, and environment.

Don't forget luck, it's a pretty important factor.

> Some people have more control over their circumstances than others. That includes parents providing (or not) for their children.

I don't think the majority of the poverty problem comes from otherwise well to do parents falling on hard luck. At least in South Africa and I would think most of the rest of Africa this is not the case. If people just made sure to be in a position where they have the capability to provide for children at the point in time when they have them the poverty issue will be almost entirely gone.

And already just something as simple as providing a two parent household and not having children before 25 already virtually guarantees that they will not be impoverished:

- https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/dont-deny-the-link-b...

- https://www.businessinsider.com/parents-determine-child-succ...

>I don't think the majority of the poverty problem comes from otherwise well to do parents falling on hard luck

I don't disagree - competent people, who have learned successful strategies, are unlikely to be reduced to permanent poverty except in extreme cases.

However, for those born into poverty, growing up surrounded by ignorance and lack of stimulation does make it exceedingly difficult to learn necessary life strategies to begin the slow, often times multigenerational climb out of poverty. First and foremost, what no one is willing to admit, combating poverty, at least in first world nations, really comes down to combating culture. And because a large proportion of certain (not all) minorities live within this culture, the idea of changing their way of life, even if you think it's ostensibly for the better, is understandably a sensitive subject.

But the way we dance around it isn't doing anyone any favors.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com