Income Inequality

[ssu]

My personal experience with The Poor has left me unhopeful. Perhaps yours has been better?

I think it can be better. Meaning that not everything is lost. Not as much as some idealist social engineer would want, but still. The way I see it, believing in some ideological answer is the road to hell in this matter. Perhaps the only ideology is that human life should be cherised... and all the thing constitutions etc. blabber about. Yet a totally ideological approach will bring misery as it will utterly fail.

Eradicating absolute povetry through welfar has the following (from my own experience):

1) Those who genuinely want to become criminals are typically the criminals (and drug addicts, who have an expensive lifestyle). Nobody is forced into crime... but crime naturally persists.

2) One has to import beggars from other countries, if one has to have beggars in the streets.

3) Apathy and alienation from the society persists, and can increase in a welfare state. Povetry isn't a simple thing.

Anyway, the society is a far more complex thing that people admit it to be.

[Martin Hash]

I don't have answers for the Bottom Half except to not expect anything. I am a "jobs for everyone" person, and that's probably the best we can do.

It's the go-getters that I understand, and want to help. Most can be Middle Class, nothing wrong with that, and a LUCKY few will jackpot. Take care of these people & liberty will flourish. Ignore them & they will side with the socialists.

[Hanarchy Montanarchy]

I don't have answers for the Bottom Half except to not expect anything. I am a "jobs for everyone" person, and that's probably the best we can do.

It's the go-getters that I understand, and want to help. Most can be Middle Class, nothing wrong with that, and a LUCKY few will jackpot. Take care of these people & liberty will flourish. Ignore them & they will side with the socialists.

OR the National Socialists, as the case may be.

[jbird4049]

My personal experience with The Poor has left me unhopeful. Perhaps yours has been better?

This is America, I'm more concerned that people who have pushed for the Bass Ring get a taste.

The Poor is not a condition, it's a state-of-mind. Not having money does not relate to not having ambition, but being The Poor does.

The poor often become The Poor when they get kicked in the teeth once too often. Using my family, and their friends, as examples as being merely the poor. One side actually owned a bank, richest people I think in the county. And then came the Great Depression. Or the members who lost everything from the Luftwaffe. Or the friends who came from working class from the same time. Or the not so extreme cases of family elsewhere in the country. After the the Great Depression and Second World War and into the 60s we were a sorry lot. But there were plenty of chances, and as my Dad said about him, and Mom, they knew, or felt enough to keep it together and keep trying until they succeeded.

But where are the cheap housing near orchards, and canneries, and good schools, and excellent cheap colleges? Or the unionized factories, or the companies like Hewlett-Packard that would take ex-marines and give them a life long career? Or government programs that takes a working mother, pays(gives) a nursing degree and a job?

Just about every path my family and their friends took either no longer exists or is much much muchharder, much less forgiving of mistakes. Aside from the willingness to work and an abundance of chances, there is nothing different from them and poor people today. Well except for all the economic winds in their sails.

If my screwball family, and their friends, were transported to today, they would probably, almost certainly, remain poor, or working class.

[TheReal_ND]

Or the members who lost everything from the Luftwaffe

Old German saying:
If you see silver planes that's Americans.
If you see brown planes that's the English.
If you see no planes, that's ours.

[jbird4049]

I was pointing out that there are more millionaires that are working for someone else than "self made" millionaires.

How many doctors and/or lawyers have a wealth of more than a million. I bet a lot in the US.

One reason btw, why health care costs are so high in the US:

Two reasons for that. A government supported cartel that limits the number of new doctors, and the insane amounts of student debt they have to pay off.

[Martin Hash]

My personal experience with The Poor has left me unhopeful. Perhaps yours has been better?

This is America, I'm more concerned that people who have pushed for the Bass Ring get a taste.

The Poor is not a condition, it's a state-of-mind. Not having money does not relate to not having ambition, but being The Poor does.

The poor often become The Poor when they get kicked in the teeth once too often. Using my family, and their friends, as examples as being merely the poor. One side actually owned a bank, richest people I think in the county. And then came the Great Depression. Or the members who lost everything from the Luftwaffe. Or the friends who came from working class from the same time. Or the not so extreme cases of family elsewhere in the country. After the the Great Depression and Second World War and into the 60s we were a sorry lot. But there were plenty of chances, and as my Dad said about him, and Mom, they knew, or felt enough to keep it together and keep trying until they succeeded.

But where are the cheap housing near orchards, and canneries, and good schools, and excellent cheap colleges? Or the unionized factories, or the companies like Hewlett-Packard that would take ex-marines and give them a life long career? Or government programs that takes a working mother, pays(gives) a nursing degree and a job?

Just about every path my family and their friends took either no longer exists or is much much muchharder, much less forgiving of mistakes. Aside from the willingness to work and an abundance of chances, there is nothing different from them and poor people today. Well except for all the economic winds in their sails.

If my screwball family, and their friends, were transported to today, they would probably, almost certainly, remain poor, or working class.

I saw a guy posting into this forum just a few days ago; working 3 jobs, long shifts, minimum wage, no money, lots of ambition. I didn't consider him poor. Were your relatives poorer than that?

[jbird4049]

Or the members who lost everything from the Luftwaffe

Old German saying:
If you see silver planes that's Americans.
If you see brown planes that's the English.
If you see no planes, that's ours.

They were ultimately on the winning side! The Germans had a lot of planes earlier in the war.

[Martin Hash]

I was pointing out that there are more millionaires that are working for someone else than "self made" millionaires.

How many doctors and/or lawyers have a wealth of more than a million. I bet a lot in the US.

One reason btw, why health care costs are so high in the US:

Two reasons for that. A government supported cartel that limits the number of new doctors, and the insane amounts of student debt they have to pay off.

Yeah, it's a racket. My year there were 16,000 M.D. graduates that couldn't get Residencies. My degree cost something like a half-million dollars when you factor in Opportunity Cost. Huge scam, other nations don't do this shit.

[TheReal_ND]

I saw a guy posting into this forum just a few days ago; working 3 jobs, long shifts, minimum wage, no money, lots of ambition. I didn't consider him poor. Were your relatives poorer than that?

That's a good way to gyp yourself. Better off losing a job and going to look for one good one and maybe keep a side job if he needs to.