Nearly 1 in 6 Americans in poverty | Hacker News Reader

Nearly 1 in 6 Americans in poverty

finance.yahoo.com

8 pointschailatte21 comments

Poverty is a complex issue that requires more than just knee jerk solutions and tossing money at it. I don't know the answer, and I'm not positive that there is an "answer". But I can tell you that people like me have a tendency to tune out when we read things like:

The poor include Nekisha Brooks, 28, of Fort Washington, Md., who lost her job as a customer service representative for AT&T several months ago in a round of layoffs. Raising five young children, she is now on food stamps and partly leaning on friends and family for help.

I know this is just one anecdote, and it is unfortunate that she clearly wants to work and is having trouble finding even semi-skilled labor... but _five_ kids? Seriously?

This reminds me of a conversation I was having recently with some engaged friends of mine, who are in their early 30s and were worried about whether they were really financially ready to have children yet. Of course they were extremely middle-class and presumably have a combined income well into the six-figure range, but they were still worried about whether they could financially support one kid. And then you've got stuff like this.

Whenever they interview a poor person for one of these sorts of articles, it always seems to be someone who has managed to make some really bad life decisions.

This should make us happy -- it indicates that if you can avoid the following bad lifestyle decisions:

1. Gambling

2. Drugs

3. Excessive alcohol

4. Becoming a single mother

5. Dropping out of high school

then your chances of being poor in America are really extremely low.

Not sure about #4. Single parenthood can sometimes be a choice (e.g. mother with donor), but it's much more likely not to be (e.g. unwilling divorce, death of a partner, teenagers who aren't ready).

Well, the vast majority of cases are caused by failure to use (sufficient) contraception by unmarried couples, which is a bad lifestyle decision. And even for divorce the vast majority of cases are caused by marrying an inappropriate person -- another poor lifestyle decision.

Agree. Leaving aside the obvious issue with the fiscal (in)ability of the parents to care and support for a large number of children, I can't help but view something like this as grossly irresponsible just in terms of population growth, sustainability, and related facets.

There are some straightforward solutions to many of these problems that have been made more complex (unnecessarily) because they cross precious lines of ideology and religion, among other things.

For example, there are homosexual couples in the world who want children. Many are wealthy enough to adopt more than one child. In any sane debate it should be unquestionable that a child is better off being child #1 in a middle-class family, with better opportunities for economic and social stability than they would have as child #5 in a poor household. But there are people who would shout until they're blue in the face to prevent this from happening, simply because the parents are gay.

Another extremely unpopular but practical solution is contraceptives and even abortion. Why are parents shamed into birthing a child that they cannot afford to raise, in a world whose population is greater than at any point in history? Unquestionably if the average size of families decreased, incomes would be less strained and poverty levels would have a fighting chance to go down as well.

A third unpopular solution is grouped housing. For some reason it's been hammered into everyone's heads that they should have a house and a yard and a dog, and that a single family should live in it. But the reality is that a large structure could hold 2 families or more, if people were willing to live like that. It would not only decrease costs, but it would improve nutrition: it's much more practical to cook a decent meal for many people than for a few people (it's easier to acquire good food in quantities that won't go to waste, etc.).

You missed the fourth.

http://www.truth-out.org/goodbye-all-reflections-gop-operati...

Jebus, Rich-white-guys-who-look-and-talk-like-dad bankrupting the country, a social safety net. Pick two.

The "poverty line" is arbitrarily set to get the proper number of people into various government programs. It has no objective meaning. This news just means that the poverty level has been chosen badly.

Edit: source https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Poverty_in_th...

Exactly, the "poor" in the United States have it better than the middle class in Europe. This is from an article today,

"...the typical household considered "poor" by census officials has a car and air conditioning. For entertainment, the household has cable or satellite TV, two color televisions, a DVD player and a VCR. If children (especially boys) are in the home, they have a video game system such as Xbox or PlayStation. In the kitchen, the household has the ordinary conveniences: refrigerator, oven, stove, microwave.

Half the poor now have a personal computer. A third have a widescreen TV (plasma or LCD); a quarter have a digital video recorder such as TiVo."

Well, of course, as one would expect the poor to take out hugely unfair debt agreements to load up their small houses in bad neighbourds with all the electronic gear they can muster for as much entertainment as they can barely afford to have.

They do not, unlike the (European and American) middle class take foreign holidays, drive foreign cars, take trips to the movies, go to theme parks, go on school trips, shop at nice places, eat healithly, etc...just because they have a bunch of cheap electronics crap stuffed inside their homes it does not make them rich.

Seriously, what do you think life is like for the European middle class? In rich Europe, it's extremely comfortable.

> They do not, unlike the (European and American) middle class take foreign holidays, drive foreign cars, take trips to the movies, go to theme parks, go on school trips, shop at nice places, eat healithly, etc...just because they have a bunch of cheap electronics crap stuffed inside their homes it does not make them rich.

Actually, they do, apart possibly from take foreign holidays, and even that's a suspect difference. Remember, they that they live in the US, so visiting Texas from CA, which they do, is comparable to visiting Italy from the UK.

I'll admit that "poor" is a tricky thing to define but pointing out the possession of random consumer electronics doesn't demonstrate that a household is NOT really "poor".

The presence of a social safety net, meaningful employment, food security, quality education, access to health care and the ability to save for the future are vastly more important considerations for determining poverty.

European living standards are different, but quite high if you ignore silly stuff like sq footage and consumer electronics and instead focus on real things that matter like healthcare and education.

> European living standards are different, but quite high if you ignore silly stuff like sq footage and consumer electronics and instead focus on real things that matter like healthcare and education.

US poor have free healthcare and education. (Actually, everyone does.)

The free healthcare or education isn't unlimited in the US, but it isn't free&unlimited anywhere.

I have free healthcare? So why am I still paying every time I go to the doctor?

> I have free healthcare? So why am I still paying every time I go to the doctor?

Some combination of (1) Lack of poverty, (2) you don't like the free care, (3) you don't know what's available.

Are you poor? If so, medicaid is available (or the state equivalent).

Are you a child? If so, there's a program whose name I forget.

And, there's also the local county hospital.

That said, you may prefer the care that you get by paying, but your choice doesn't imply that you couldn't get free healthcare.

Most of those are not federal programs. And some of those are kinda flimsy, like even if I could convince a family member to pay my bill that doesn't mean "we have free healthcare in America."

> Most of those are not federal programs.

Huh? 2 (medicaid and the children's program) out of 3 are federal; that's most in my book (The state versions of mediad, such as MediCal, are state/federal partnerships.)

Besides, since every state (and territory) has them, why is it relevant whether they're state or federal?

> And some of those are kinda flimsy

Huh? No, they won't do everything that you could possibly want, but neither does any other healthcare system, anywhere in the in the world, govt paid or not.

If you want to argue about the specific things that they won't do, you get to do the relevant research, including on the programs that you think are acceptable.

> like even if I could convince a family member to pay

I'm not suggesting skipping out on a bill (although that's also an option if you can't pay).

Indeed, the poverty line is chosen arbitrarily so that... well, roughly one sixth of the population get to be "poor" at all times.

Any less than that, and people who make their living off providing free stuff to the "poor" will get annoyed. Any more than that and too many people will start questioning whether someone with a $30K income is really "poor".

I certainly wouldn't want to live on $22K per annum. Though now I come to think of it, I was living on less than that, in a more expensive place than the vast majority of America, just a few short years ago as a PhD student.

Certainly we can say that in terms of absolute need, someone at the "poverty line" in America is incredibly wealthy compared to the vast majority of people who have ever lived. In historical terms, if you're not starving, you're pretty rich.

While "1 in 6" appeals as a lot, the actual statistic of 15.1% poor people seems significantly less harmful -- as, ipso facto, the vast majortity of all American people (84.9%) are not poor.

Isn't this the way the model essentially works out in our system? There is a small "working class" at the bottom, then a giant bump in the middle for the middle class, and a tiny spot at the top for the 1% of wealthy -- wealthy, not merely rich -- individuals.

I wouldn't simply try to brush off poverty, as surely every effort must be made to ensure social mobility among the classes (both up and down), but in a country as large as America having 45 or so million poor people isn't only to be expected, but actually relatively necessary for our economic model -- which, on the whole, works quite well for most people.

I think the problem recently is that the bump in the middle is getting relatively smaller, as rich people seem to be getting richer while the poor and middle-class get poorer.

Is that true, or just oft-repeated political rhetoric? (Telling the middle class that they're being ripped off is, of course, a time-honoured political ploy.)

I'm sitting in the middle of the income curve right now, and it looks fine around here. In terms of income distribution the main effect of the recession has been to destroy wealth at the top end of the scale, since these are the folks who owned all the assets which are now performing poorly.

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