Who are the 99% | Hacker News Reader

Who are the 99%

washingtonpost.com

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In the hacker community, I often hear the following reaction to this kind of story: "You got shafted by the system? I guess you shouldn't have blindly followed someone else's life script."

I'm doing well, and I can't complain. But I'm bothered by the flippant attitude toward these "99 percenters" who played the game as it was explained to them and ended up poor. Sure, for successful hackers who find their skills in demand, it's easy to say that these people are just not creative enough, that they lacked the insight to see the right path through our economic system. When your bets paid off, it's easy to criticize those whose bets didn't.

But it's unfair. Our society insistently thrusts on us a narrative that says getting an education and working hard will provide a comfortable life. And why shouldn't people be able to trust that? When the same narrative is told to us by our parents, teachers, politicians, celebrities, and just about everyone else, how can we deride those who buy into it?

The grand bargain our economic system has made with the middle class--work hard, get a degree, work hard some more, and you'll be OK--is turning out to be a lie for many people. A fair society would not put people into that position. I understand that economic fairness is not a guiding principle of our economy, but it ought to be.

The problem with this line of thinking is that there's no one person or group in charge of "society." Blaming society is the same as blaming yourself (who else makes up society but the 99%-ers?).

To me, it's disturbing that the quotes come from people who seem so detached from their own failure. I'd like to see what the majors of these people with their "advanced degrees" that can't find anyone who thinks they are worth hiring.

That said, the correct response to these folks' predicament is for them to change the culture. The best way to do that is not to stage an aimless protest, but to cut up the credit cards, get 2 or 3 jobs, and teach your children the right way to handle money.

"Blaming society is the same as blaming yourself (who else makes up society but the 99%-ers?)"

Not the slightest bit true. Economic and political power are concentrated. That's one of the main gripes of this movement. The college grads who played by the rules and got nothing for it did not set the system up that way. Their plight is due in large part to the economic crisis, which is in turn the fault of the tiny sliver of the population that gets to gamble with other people's money.

What rules? There are no rules in any society that guarantee success, except possibly in a corrupt totalitarian state. They had choices to make; some made bad ones that ignored the risk they were taking. Everyone in this story has racked up a mountain of debt. Why? Because they thought that's what everyone did when they went to school. If conventional wisdom is your only guide, small wonder you are blown and tossed by the wind.

What tiny sliver of the population forced them to go massively into student and credit card debt? Who promised them that they would get "good jobs" for getting "advanced degrees?" The president? Wall Street? "Society?" Seems like there's no one to hold accountable here but themselves.

"If conventional wisdom is your only guide, small wonder you are blown and tossed by the wind." This is exactly the attitude that I'm against. It may seem easy for us on Hacker News to ignore conventional wisdom. But I think it's perfectly fair that most people should be able to trust the advice that almost everyone in society gives them.

"What tiny sliver of the population forced them to go massively into student and credit card debt?" The sliver that does this is the one that eats up an incredibly disproportionate amount of the value in society, leaving a smaller pie for everyone else to spend on their education, housing, food, medical care, etc.. The average middle class person has been taught and fairly believes that college is a necessity for economic security. If that can only be paid for with debt, then what is such a person to do? Be an entrepreneur? Clearly, that's not for everyone. Likewise, you can't expect all these people to just figure out what careers they can have without an education, then learn it all through self-teaching.

We can't claim that all environments produce equal numbers of rich and successful people. After forcing kids to go through utterly useless high school, you say to them to get 2 or 3 jobs in an economic downturn they weren't even responsible for, using skills that aren't competitive with overseas workers in second-world countries? The kids can't improve high school while they're in it, and when they're out, it's too late.

As a society, we need a better plan (change the culture, as you put it), but many people concerned with bills, jobs, food, or even getting shot are not really thinking about the greater plan. People with no time and no money do not change the culture. They get used and abused.

The answer is multifaceted. You can't just tell people to suck it up by their bootstraps and expect things to change. It's part of it, but not all of it. You can't just legislate change, either. It's definitely also part of it, though.

Finally, these youngsters are the ones that are going to be paying for your government services after you stop being a productive taxpayer. Unless you're saving up for your drug testing, roads, and army, I'd recommend considering a helping hand. I'm for a tax increase on money over $50K AGI (which would definitely impact me) in hand with a good plan for improvement. I don't want "less" or "more" government; I want better government.

As a society, we are experiencing a crisis of feedback. There are two dimensions to this crisis: a wealth gap, and a generation gap.

How does wealth make it difficult for our society to listen? An anecdote from last year may illustrate. I was around when a PAC for an automated trading firm was being set up; there was a presentation given on the purpose of the PAC (which was to make the case that algorithmic trading can be beneficial to society). Someone asked, "What do we get per dollar spent? Are we buying influence?" One leader responded, "No, we can't buy influence. But the reality is that money equals access--access to politicians so that we can have our side heard." Given the high barrier to access, significant portions of our society feel alienated from the democratic process, and Occupy Wall Street is part of our society's struggle to introspect on fundamental problems we face--especially the broken political process.

How does age impact our society's ability to hear its own feedback? The generation gap is between the "pre-" and "post-" internet generations. By my estimation, the delineation is currently somewhere around 35 years of age. If a person is under 35, there is a good chance that he or she treats social networking tools like texting, email, twitter, facebook, reddit, etc. as first class communication. Over, and the chances are low that communication of highest import or urgency happens through these channels. The average age of the U.S. House of Representatives is 58.

The following analogy helped me understand why there is no "unified message" from protesters: "When a person has a problem, like an addiction, the first step is for them to admit the problem. The second step is to identify the problem. It's not until the third step that they try to solve the problem. Right now we need the US as a country to admit there is a problem. Then we can work on identifying it, and then on fixing it. It is no good if half of the population says "Here's how to fix the problem" when the other half is still going "what problem?" This is why it is very important to reach out to people with all sorts of different political viewpoints so that we have a better conversation when we try to figure out the cause of the problem and how to fix it." -- Granito (reddit.com)

I think we can all point to grievances or suggestions from Occupy Wall Street that are unreasonable or simplifications of larger problems. The needs that people have, however, are the more important part of this ongoing discussion, IMO. There is frustration with the processes our society has in place that give voice to the downtrodden. I think that if we keep that in mind--that we don't have to agree with every demand, but that we can agree the need for understanding and better processes exists--then there is mutual benefit to be had from this current event.

Just like a business will profit if it develops its customers, engages in their needs, and has good customer service, our society will profit by listening and understanding this new phenomenon.

I have a problem with the premise of this article. I note all but one of these people have a degree. Someone should tell Mr. Klein the unemployment rate among people with a college degree is only 4.2% which is close to the transitional rate (the rate where you have full employment and the number only represents those transitioning from job to job). I don't doubt there are those with degrees who have found themselves in bad situations but those are the exceptions.

Almost completely unrepresented in this article are the people the system really isn't servicing. Those without a High School degree have an unemployment rate of 14%. With a High School degree it's 9.7%.

Those people are the 99%. The people who NEVER had health care. The people who couldn't afford an education even in good times. The people who spent their childhoods struggling to stay alive.

> Someone should tell Mr. Klein the unemployment rate among people with a college degree is only 4.2% which is close to the transitional rate

This is the unemployment rate, which is different from the underemployment rate. It's quite possible a lot of these people have a job, but not one that fully takes advantage of their degree.

In addition to what BCM43 said, the unemployment rate also doesn't reflect discouraged workers, i.e. those who have given up on looking for jobs but would work given the opportunity.

It's surprising to me to see so many people who have such a poor understanding of how the world works.

I went to graduate school believing that there might be some financial security afforded by a higher degree, and that with that security I could finally buy my mom her own house and take care of her. Instead, I have wasted six years of my life.

I got a degree (without considering how I was going to create value for other people) and yet I'm not set up for life! Quelle Surprise!

One thing I find interesting about the stories that have been getting the most circulation is that almost all of them bemoan the system, yet very few bother to outline how they plan to improve their situation.

Seems to me a few of these people are just now realizing that shuffling through the corrals of life leads you to the slaughter house.

Six years in graduate school... going into debt to get a bfa..., 20k in debt and still paying tuition...

At what point do we say "these people just made or are making bad decisions". What job did the bfa think they were going to get? Is it the governments job to provide that for them now that they "did everything they were supposed to do and have nothing to show for it"? And if it's not the government than who?

I'm just unclear what this groups wants and how they think it should be given to them. Raise taxes on the 1% and then what? Trust that the government will create jobs for you? Raising taxes is the easy part what's the next step after that?

-- These are not rants against the system. They’re not anarchist manifestos. They’re not calls for a revolution. They’re small stories of people who played by the rules, did what they were told, and now have nothing to show for it. Or, worse, they have tens of thousands in debt to show for it. --

Heck, so you make a mistake and then blame Wall St, or someone extremely rich for it? If you listened to someone, and they were wrong, it's not their mistake, it's yours.

Now you are in debt, without a home, a job and with an uncertain future. I live in a third-world country, I didn't listen to the people, I didn't listen to the society and their rules. I went and started my own consulting company, rent a flat, carrying on my studies, working and learning all day... Now I'm making a double professor salary and I'm only 20 years old. I'm the 1%.

The people who took on too much housing debt, and the banks who lent to them, were either greedy, or foolish, or a combination of the two. None of them deserve a public bailout.

I've always been in IT, so I don't know if my experience applies or not. But in my field, I have to continuously keep studying and learning -- and that keeps my value up. I _suspect_ (and see it around me) that many people land a j.o.b. and then just coast. They don't continue to work hard (ie studying, reading, staying abreast) and then are suprised to get caught. In other words, (prior) education != marketable skills.

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