On being poor in America.

[powderman]

http://inamerica.blogs.cnn.com/2012/09/20/on-being-poor/?hpt=hp_t3
 
People line up at a food pantry. The number of people in poverty rose in 17 states, the Census Bureau says.    September 20th, 2012  05:02 PM ET     On being poor  By Moni Basu, CNN
(CNN) The Census Bureau released a depressing statistic Thursday: 46.2 million people in America fell below the poverty line last year. One in five children are poor.
What does it feel like to live in poverty?
Writer John Scalzi knows.
He remembers a Southern California childhood marred by a broken family. His mother put her two children in the back of the car and drove away from the home they’d known.
She bought a box of Raisin Bran and warned her children: “That has to last.”
  John Scalzi's essay on poverty was based on his own experiences. Scalzi, 43, was in the first grade then.
Years later, the Raisin Bran memory became a line in an essay called “Being Poor.” He wrote it in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, when so many asked why the poor of New Orleans had not fled their drowned city.
It occurred to him then that wealthier Americans did not understand that the poor do not always have the luxury of choice.
But he knew.
He was the kid who wore the cheap shoes from Lucky Drug Store – the ones with the glued-on soles. He could feel them come off on the playground.
He was the kid who discovered letters from his mom to his dad begging for child support and the kid hoping he would get invited to a friend’s for dinner. He once stole a piece of meat from Ralph’s supermarket, fried it up and cleaned the plate before Mom came home. He then told her she didn’t have to make any dinner because he wasn’t hungry anyway.
Here are a few other ways Scalzi measured poverty:
 
 

Being poor is getting angry at your kids for asking for all the crap they see on TV.
Being poor is going to the restroom before you get in the school lunch line so your friends will be ahead of you and won’t hear you say “I get free lunch” when you get to the cashier.
Being poor is living next to the freeway.
Being poor is a heater in only one room of the house.
Being poor is hoping your kids don’t have a growth spurt.
Being poor is Goodwill underwear.
Being poor is thinking $8 an hour is a really good deal.
Being poor is stopping the car to take a lamp from a stranger’s trash.
Being poor is making lunch for your kid when a cockroach skitters over the bread, and you looking over to see if your kid saw.
Being poor is a sidewalk with lots of brown glass on it.
Being poor is picking the 10 cent ramen instead of the 12 cent ramen because that’s two extra packages for every dollar.

Read Scalzi’s full essay here.

[guzzijohn]

I don't believe it, Powderman using something from CNN! I thought that was the Communist News Network.
GuzziJohn

[Awf Hand]

Since my wife went on a medical mission trip to Ecuador, I have considerably less pity for the poor in America.  Did this guy actually say that mom stopped "the car" to pick up a lamp, or suggest that he was embarrassed by getting a "free lunch"?
 
The only worse thing than being poor here in America is being poor anywhere else.

[Conan The Librarian]

Try being poor outside of America and see how it goes....dead beggars floating in the river...perpetual semi-starvation...living in true squalor...eating garbage.... Etc.
 
The poor in America are obese, own cars, and live in real buildings, and have luxuries like televisions.

[Conan The Librarian]

Right you are, Awf Hand. I wrote my post before reading yours.

[ironglow]

  Being "poor" in the U.S. today, isn't like being poor outside the U.S...It isn't even anywhere near like being poor in the U.S. was some 50-60 years ago....
As an American kid of 50-60 years ago, I was one of the "poor"..most of my neighbors were not much better off . I took the liberty to compare his "poorness" to what I experienced earlier, but still refuse to whine about..
    ****************************************************************
     quote author=powderman link=topic=265000.msg1099578634#msg1099578634 date=1348237715]
http://inamerica.blogs.cnn.com/2012/09/20/on-being-poor/?hpt=hp_t3
 
People line up at a food pantry. The number of people in poverty rose in 17 states, the Census Bureau says.    September 20th, 2012  05:02 PM ET     On being poor  By Moni Basu, CNN
(CNN) The Census Bureau released a depressing statistic Thursday: 46.2 million people in America fell below the poverty line last year. One in five children are poor.
What does it feel like to live in poverty?
Writer John Scalzi knows.
He remembers a Southern California childhood marred by a broken family. His mother put her two children in the back of the car and drove away from the home they’d known.
She bought a box of Raisin Bran and warned her children: “That has to last.”
  John Scalzi's essay on poverty was based on his own experiences. Scalzi, 43, was in the first grade then.
Years later, the Raisin Bran memory became a line in an essay called “Being Poor.” He wrote it in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, when so many asked why the poor of New Orleans had not fled their drowned city.
It occurred to him then that wealthier Americans did not understand that the poor do not always have the luxury of choice.
But he knew.
He was the kid who wore the cheap shoes from Lucky Drug Store – the ones with the glued-on soles. He could feel them come off on the playground.
He was the kid who discovered letters from his mom to his dad begging for child support and the kid hoping he would get invited to a friend’s for dinner. He once stole a piece of meat from Ralph’s supermarket, fried it up and cleaned the plate before Mom came home. He then told her she didn’t have to make any dinner because he wasn’t hungry anyway.
Here are a few other ways Scalzi measured poverty:  As compared to earlier years..
 
 

Being poor is getting angry at your kids for asking for all the crap they see on TV.

Couldn't beg for the stuff on TV..didn't have a TV.
Being poor is going to the restroom before you get in the school lunch line so your friends will be ahead of you and won’t hear you say “I get free lunch” when you get to the cashier.  Never took "free lunch" I brown-bagged it, mostly with home-grown stuff.
Being poor is living next to the freeway. Or living in the country without refrigeration or running water.
Being poor is a heater in only one room of the house. The wood stove only heated one room in th euninsulated house.
Being poor is hoping your kids don’t have a growth spurt. Only costly when my eldest brother had a growth spurt..rest got hand-me down.
Being poor is Goodwill underwear. nope
Being poor is thinking $8 an hour is a really good deal. in the late 40s, early 50s.. I believe dad got $1.40 at the grain mill.
Being poor is stopping the car to take a lamp from a stranger’s trash.  Our neighbors, nearly as poor as we, didn't trash usable items.
Being poor is making lunch for your kid when a cockroach skitters over the bread, and you looking over to see if your kid saw. Never dealt with cockroaches, but would have been more careful if i had to.
Being poor is a sidewalk with lots of brown glass on it.  Being poor in the country is having NO sidewalk..and being lucky if the road is paved
Being poor is picking the 10 cent ramen instead of the 12 cent ramen because that’s two extra packages for every dollar.  No Ramen back then, but pancakes every morning does get tedious.  But Dad & Mom were resourceful..and the garden did wonders..plus Dad hunting and fishing..brought protein and a bit of hide mobney..
  Read Scalzi’s full essay here.

[Shu]

Even the poor in America are fat. Even though there are alot of low income families it doesn't mean poor. When you have a TV and the kids are hungry did you make a good choice with that money? Did you really need those 200$ tennis shoes?
 
We ate alot of garden stuff, hunted, fished etc. I wore alot of hand me downs, we didn't always have a TV, and Pops always made sure there was food in the house.  It was a matter of priorities.

[briarpatch]

I not going to swipe with a broad brush on this but I will say using my family only. Those that are poor want to be poor and will stand and cry until someone feeds them. They want seek work nor will they save when they get it. They think the world owes them a living and believe the government has unlimited funds for them. They are dems and will tell you they have to vote to keep up their lifestyle. While I and others are working they are hunting and chasing their neighbors wives. In my family being poor is a mind set. A well paying mind set.

[m-g Willy]

I've never been poor.
But there was times that bean soup was what was for supper 5 times a week.
Same ham bone in each pound of beans!,till there wasn't a scent left that the dog could detect.
Then we would splurge and have chicken and dumplings (with a lot of dumplings!)
Waterfoul season would come in and we would be eating like kings  with duck and goose on the table.
Deer hunting was for meat, because you didn't eat the rack.
Times were hard but I was never poor.
.
 
 

[mechanic]

I spent a large part of my childhood in a house with no plumbing, water drawn from a well with a bucket.  We did have electricity...light bulbs hung from a cord with a pull chain switch.  We ate what we killed, grew, or traded for.  Trips to the store were once a month for "staples".  I had to work at age 10 to supplement the family income.
 
But I've never gone hungry, naked, homeless, and I've never been poor.
 
Ben

[powderman]

A lot of good responses, poor in America would be living like a king in many countries. A family I knew down the street,  growing up in ILL, ate beans 7 days a week, their Mom made biskits or cornbread every day, but they all grew up healthy. I can't remember any new clothes as a kid, all hand me downs.
 
WE had our garden, canned all our veggies for year round use. We did eat some beef or pork but mostly it was fish, rabbit, squirrel, dove, quail, venison, even ground hog. Every Sat supper was eggs and fried potatoes, Sunday supper was corn meal mush. Mom made a lot of xtra so it could gel. Next morning she'd slice and fry some for breakfast for several days.
We always had plenty to eat but a lot of it was what we grew, caught, or killed.
 
One guy I grew up with was part of a family with 6 kids, his Mom worked hard to feed and clothe them all taking in laundry, cleaning others houses, etc, their Dad was killed in an accident.
Willy and I went camping and I made some gravy for supper, 1st time he'd ever had milk gravy. I realized then how blessed I'd been.
I reckon by todays standard we grew up poor, difference was, we didn't know it. POWDERMAN.   

[Sourdough]

I can relate to what he is saying, and I can relate to what Awf Hand and Conan are saying as well.

I grew up poor in America.  Dried Beans and Corn Bread would make up lunch and dinner both.  If we were lucky an onion might find it's way into the beans, or maybe a chunk of salt fat back.  A biscuit and water for breakfast, nothing else.  Mom getting bacon grease from other women so she could make gravy for our biscuits was a treat, since we could not afford bacon.  Being hungry enough to go out and steal corn, and vegatibles from farmers fields so we could have something to eat beside dried beans and cornbread.  Hiding in the restroom and not having lunch at school because Mom did not have the .35 cents for lunch and was too proud to apply for the free lunch program.  Any kid that brought their lunch and did not keep an eye on it lost that lunch bag, and it was never seen again.  Picking up Coke bottles along the road, they brought three cents apiece.  Three cents bought a whole loaf of bread at the Martha White thrift store.  Really liked going to spend the summer with my Grand Parents where we had sausage or bacon with our biscuits and gravy, and eggs for breakfast.  Meat for lunch and dinner, along with vegitables from the garden.  The meat was often something my Grandfather had shot such as grouse, squirrel, or rabbit, or from a Turkey, Chicken, Hog, or Calf they had butchered.  Looking forward to spring because the shoes bought last fall were way too small and you looked for any reason not to wear them, and new ones were not coming till next fall.  Wearing hand me down from cousins and friends of the family.  Having the electricity shut off in the spring due to non payment, and leaving it off till the fall because it was not needed during the summer.  Getting a beating if we ever mentioned something that might make it look like we were poor, or did not have enough to eat.  Yet I was so skinny people knew.  The Church would leave baskets of food on our door step at Thanksgiving and Christmas.  Real fruit and meat in those baskets.  I was in band and the Band Director knew why I was so skinny.  He saw to it that I had food to eat when we went on trips.  He usually had me eat at his table with his family, and he always paid.  I was 6'2" and only weighted 117 lbs when I graduated High School then left home and went into the Air Force.  In basic training for the first time in my life I was able to eat all I wanted.  I did not have to feel afraid I was eating too much, and not leaving enough for the others.  I gained from 117 lbs to 145 lbs in sixteen weeks of basic.  (I spent an extra ten weeks in a medical program because I was so underweight).  My mother resented my leaving home and going into the AF.  Those four months I worked between graduating and leaving I made more than my father did each week.  I had a job as a cashier in a grocery store.  Mom forced me to bring my paycheck home and give it to her.  She made me sign it so she could take it to the bank and cash it and keep the money.  She gave me just enough for gas to and from work.  Today she wonders why I left home.  In her eyes that ruined me.

Yet I grew up in Hendersonville Tennessee, one of the richest areas of Tennessee.  Where we were looked down on as trash by most folks.  Dad rented a little tennent farmers house.  Two bedrooms, I shared a bedroom with four brothers.  Five of us in two beds.  Mom and Dad taking their frustrations out on us kids.  Getting a beating over almost anything.  A switch used on us till blood ran down our legs from the cuts on our backs.  Then being told, I brought you into this world and I'll take you out if you so much as ever tell anyone about this or let them see your bloody backs.  Too afraid to let the authorities know, too afraid they would not do anything anyway, and only make things worse.

Then during my tour in the AF I got to see real squaller and destitution.  I went to Turkey, and the Middle East, where fathers would break their little girls legs and cripple them so they would make better beggars.  Then down to Africa, where the babies were dying because the mothers did not have enough to eat and her milk dried up.  People dying of starvation because they had been run off their land by another ethnic group that did not think they should be allowed to live any way.  They were the wrong religion, not Muslim. 

I realized at least in America I had the ability to make a good life for myself and my family.  The reason I had grown up so poor was due to my parents both being too uncaring and believing an education did not mean anything and too proud to admit it and finish school.  They both dropped out at the 8th grade.  They blamed all their troubles on the rich folks and other people, keeping them suppressed all their lives.  And being too proud to admit their short comings, and accept help.

My best friends father told me I could do anything I wanted, I just had to have the drive and the belief that I could do anything I wanted to do.  I envied my friend Larry, because his father brought home more in one week than my father brought home in a month.  That's when I realized Larry's Dad had an education, something my Dad did not have.  That was the difference in our Dads.  That gave me the hunger to get an education and to go farther in life than what my parents were preparing me for.

I look at the five of us boys and see a big difference.  I the oldest consider my self successful.  My wife and I have everything we want, more than we need.  Our boys are both doing well, and the oldest has a family that is doing well also.  The youngest is still living at home and going to college.  My brother three also went into the Air Force.  He did not make a career out of it, but got out and became a Carpenter/Construction contractor.  He builds custom homes for people in the music industry, and is a millionare today.  Brother five ran away when he was 16, and married a woman in Texas.  Texas Judge refused to send him back and made his wife his guardian.  Her parents helped him get a good job and helped him finish his education.  Today he is doing well, he and his wife have a big home and are very happy.  Both of their kids are grown and both have a college education, and a good career going.  Then there is brothers number two and four.  These two followed in Mom and Dad's foot steps.  They blame their lack of success on everyone else.  They live from day to day, not sure where their next meal is coming from, or if they will be able to pay the rent and electric next month.  Living on government handouts, and resenting the other three of us for not being in the same position they are in.  They don't want to come up to our standards, they want us down to their level of living.  Over the years they have refused any help or suggestions on how to improve their standard of living.  There kids are following right along in their foot steps as well.  Looking for the free government handouts.  By the way they are staunch Democrates.  Brother 1,3,and 5 are Republicans.  Figure that?

OK, I've had my rant and aired the dirty laundry of my chidlhood.  I'm not proud of the past, but I'm proud of where I have gone.  Last year my mother was telling me how hard a time she had raising us boys and how she did not have anything as we were growing up.  How she did not have the money to buy food and clothing we needed.  Times were tough and she could do no better, the world was against her all the way.  I finally said what I had wanted to say for a long time.  I turned to her and said, "What did you expect you and Dad being a couple of high school drop outs".  I should not have said it but I could not hold back.  I was tired of hearing her blaming others for her short comings.  As anyone can tell, her and I don't get along.  I'll never forget those beatings, broken bones, and concussions.

This is a side of me few people would expect to hear.  But there are poor people here in America, the kids I feel sorry for.  But the adults only have themselves to blame.

[rkeltner]

i have been poor by thjis country's standards, but have never considered myself poor! food, shelter, clothing...these i have always had, often in abudance during these 'poor' times. ultimately, it's about one's perspective of the situation! you manage with what you have, tighten the belt when you must, and enjoy the bounty when you have it.

[magooch]

I guess I've been lucky, or maybe done the right things, because I've never been poor; I guess my parents had a hand in that.  As a yute, I could never have imagined living like I do now and in fact I have to pinch myself occasionally to see if it's real. 
 
What is disturbing and even scary is seeing our great country that has allowed this magnificent abundance to be set on a course to ruin by communists and those who voted them to power.

[powderman]

SOURDOUGH. Thanks for sharing my friend. Americans have more and appreciate it less than any nation on earth. We waste more of everything in one day than many folks have in a month.
When my leg was broke in 1986 one of the boys said, Dad, I hate being poor. I said POOR?? We have a warm house, plenty of wood for the stoves, comfortable beds, our house is warm and dry, and we have the love of Jesus in our hearts. We ain't poor son, we just don't have any money.
POWDERMAN. 

[Ranger99]

my folks were poor dollarwise, but always had
love and compassion.
i'll always remember the bad times they had
financially and possession-wise and i'll be
eternally grateful for what i have.
everything i have is old and used, but there
is always someone somewhere that can only
dream of having half of what i have.

[ironglow]

  "When times get tough, the tough get going".  During such times we all pulled together..that's family!  Tough times cemented our family together.
   As I said, in my country neighborhood, most neighbors were not much better off financially..so none of us considered ourselves "poor" as folks often do today.  My family had it a bit tougher, because within a 7 year period, I had 2 brothers die, our house burned down and another brother born with major medical problems...but Dad paid all those bills with 0% govt help.not much financial breathing space for Mom & Dad.
 When my next younger brother died from polio (1944)..the "March of Dimes" offered to pay partial costs...but I recall my Dad's reply:  "We can manage..please help somebody who really needs it".
 
  Different ytime, different people, different values..

[powderman]

The Amish have a saying. Wear it out, use it up, or do without. POWDERMAN. 

[streak]

Sourdough,
 Thanks for that insight of your life! I can relate to some of it myself! I remember
 when I was around 6 or 7 we moved to a house in Carthage, Texas that had a burned out attic that had not been repaired, and large cotton rats were in it, it was the only place my parents could afford at that time! It was quite traumatic when storms would hit! Before that we lived in a solid tin house in McLeod, Texas which was two story, probably had been a warehouse at one time! You did not want to be there at night time in a hail storm!! All of this took place in the early to mid forties. But my daddy perservered and we finally had a nice home built in Shreveport. We did manage to eat fairly well as both of my grand parents had farms and fresh vegetables! But money was a rare commodity!
Growing up under these conditions really makes you appreciate the finer things of life!! Also gives you compassion for your fellow man that maybe has not been so lucky!!

[ironglow]

Sourdough,
 Thanks for that insight of your life! I can relate to some of it myself! I remember
 when I was around 6 or 7 we moved to a house in Carthage, Texas that had a burned out attic that had not been repaired, and large cotton rats were in it, it was the only place my parents could afford at that time! It was quite traumatic when storms would hit! Before that we lived in a solid tin house in McLeod, Texas which was two story, probably had been a warehouse at one time! You did not want to be there at night time in a hail storm!! All of this took place in the early to mid forties. But my daddy perservered and we finally had a nice home built in Shreveport. We did manage to eat fairly well as both of my grand parents had farms and fresh vegetables! But money was a rare commodity!
Growing up under these conditions really makes you appreciate the finer things of life!! Also gives you compassion for your fellow man that maybe has not been so lucky!!

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  Streak;
  Thank you for your first-hand description of your early years.  As I was trying to point out..people who call themselves "poor" today have been "talked into" believing they are poor.  Your folks and mine, even though stricken with hardships, did not stay down...through hard work, perseverence and doing many dirty but honest, "odd jobs' that other might not like getting their hands dirty or rough over did succeed...  Soon, the folks bought a dairy farm and between working his machine shop job.. and the farm, they pulled themselves out of a situation where we see others today..giving up and becoming a "ward of the state".. My two youngest brothers did go to college, primarily because of my Dad's hard work.  Dad didn't live to see it..he died when my youngest brother was fourteen.
  Both these brothers are successful, one swallowed the leftist drivel, the other was not sucked in by it.   One is a Dem one a Rep..one a retired teacher/coach, the other X-ray technologist & real estate.  I too entered the military (Army) at 18 yrs.  My college experiences such as they are, came later in life...it was simply an affirmation of what I learned the hard way.  Having "been there, done that" already, I wasn't suckered in by leftist propaganda so easily as kids fresh out of an inadequate public high school.
   
Sourdough;
 Funny isn't it how some here cry about being "poor"..while running on $100 sneakers and wearing a special hoodie where they can carry their I-phone.  Then they go home to a house rented, heated and lit up by US..sit down to a meal, largely provided by US and whine about how "poor" they are...
   I wonder though, even if they saw some of the poverty you described as being present in Turkey and sub-Saharan Africa; if they could  relate or even empathize with the destitution.
  Frankly, I think most of those who cry"poor" are only convinced of it by self-serving politicians and well known, millionaire "poverty pimps"..whose names,  most of us know by heart. Besides, there are government checks awaiting those who cry the loudest!

[Cuts Crooked]

Being poor is watching your parents bodies being put in an unmarked hole in "Potters Field" when you are four years old, and there are no family members to step forward to take you in.

Being poor is being a "ward of the state" and used as slave labor on "foster farms".

Being poor is being beaten with a strop because you are too sick work on the "foster farm".

Being poor is getting a job when you are eight years old, shoveling coal in a boiler room for 15 cents an hour and thinking it's the greatest thing to ever happen to you.

Being poor can make you into a rotten, vicious, little monster who hates everyone and who, fights authority at every turn, even when it's good for you. And sometimes that stuff lasts into adulthood.

But the worst part of being poor is knowing.......at way too early an age......that fairy tales ain't true, and that the good guy doesn't win, and that John Wayne heros and wonderful endings are just Bull shift.

[powderman]

Funny isn't it how some here cry about being "poor"..while running on $100 sneakers and wearing a special hoodie where they can carry their I-phone.  Then they go home to a house rented, heated and lit up by US..sit down to a meal, largely provided by US and whine about how "poor" they are...
   I wonder though, even if they saw some of the poverty you described as being present in Turkey and sub-Saharan Africa; if they could  relate or even empathize with the destitution.
  Frankly, I think most of those who cry"poor" are only convinced of it by self-serving politicians and well known, millionaire "poverty pimps"..whose names,  most of us know by heart. Besides, there are government checks awaiting those who cry the loudest!

 
IG. That covers it pretty good. POWDERMAN. 

[ironglow]

Being poor is watching your parents bodies being put in an unmarked hole in "Potters Field" when you are four years old, and there are no family members to step forward to take you in.

Being poor is being a "ward of the state" and used as slave labor on "foster farms".

Being poor is being beaten with a strop because you are too sick work on the "foster farm".

Being poor is getting a job when you are eight years old, shoveling coal in a boiler room for 15 cents an hour and thinking it's the greatest thing to ever happen to you.

Being poor can make you into a rotten, vicious, little monster who hates everyone and who, fights authority at every turn, even when it's good for you. And sometimes that stuff lasts into adulthood.

But the worst part of being poor is knowing.......at way too early an age......that fairy tales ain't true, and that the good guy doesn't win, and that John Wayne heros and wonderful endings are just Bull shift.

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    Cuts;
  I can understand the frustration of a youngster in such a case.  I was fortunate in that my parents cared..even though not demonstrative in their love.  They could have adopted us each out at different times but they chose to "see it through". They were disciplinarians though, and I often had the "stripes" to show for it.
  I forgot to mention above..when I was 6, our house burned to the ground with everything in it at about 2AM one morning.  Dad did save his Ithaca shotgun which was near the door..and after counting heads....came back to fetch me out of the fire, but the folks still trudged on.
  Cuts had the extra burden of not having caring parents to look out for his welfare..but he rose above that.  Yes, that bitterness can continue into adulthood, so we do not need "poverty pimps" who stir the coals of dissatisfaction and do nothing more..other than rake in million$$ for themselves!  "Race" is their wedge..a wedge which is rarely valid anymore..but still they fool some into dancing to their tune.
  Sourdough has already outlined how defeatism can overtake anyone who wishes to buy into "they" did it to me.. or, it is "their fault" I never get anywhere..  If one keeps blaming the "other guy" for their own mistakes and poor choices, they will go nowhere, but sit in a cold corner saying"woe is me"...

[mcwoodduck]

I'd say that's pretty true Cuts, in many many cases. And there's a huge difference between country poor and urban-city poor.  I grew up on small dairy farm, too small to stay in business during modernization with bulk tanks and such. Never much material or consumer bought stuff around, not even a TeeVee.. I don't think I ever had more than 50 cents in my pocket until age 16, but I was a pretty good student and could play baseball and so got on with college and such.
.
Point is country poor folks often have more resources to draw from than city poor,,,,small and big game, gardens, foraging, farm animals, protein, and such, plus the light of day and a family unit,,,and a much more secure outlook..  City or urban poor more or less hold up in small cubicles eating macaroni with festering bad attitudes, paying the landlord, and not many alternative choices.
.
Its not too valid to compare country and rural poorer folks with the city-urban underclass.
.
...TM7

And you are even bringing class warfare into the difference between the "poor"  the real problem is that the government is rich and the people are poor.  The taxes we pay have gone up and up to pay for the government and their managment of the poor.  After all with out the poor we would not need the government agencies that admisister to them and in order to grow their budgets they need more poor.  Sounds like a cycle of nothing but more poor.

[ironglow]

In the 1960s LB Johnson launched his "war on poverty"...we have spent trillions of dollars on "poverty" and have more now than ever.
  All LBJ's "social engineering" did was drive fathers out of their families, exhonorate the absconders from caring for children they fathered and allowed..nay encouraged... the never do well..never work types,  with plenty of excuses.

[ironglow]

woodduck...that's not what I said...its what you think...All I said is there's a big difference in resources and choices between rural poor and city-urban poor....not really arguable.  If you live in the country and would like to meet some urban poor, just cut social service budgets to the bone, and I bet you will get to meet some of those folks sooner than later.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Mr. IG ...the real problem occurred when it became necessary to exploit women and draw them into the work force wherein once a working man could support his family and home. Shortly there after it became necesary for two incomes to buy a home and support a family.  That's what happened and can't be blamed much on Great Society programs, although I agree it puts some homeless even more without hope.
.
...TM7

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  TM:
  You have a point concerning the two parents working thing..that can cause strains.   The wife and I both worked for years..but when that was necessary we worked opposite hours, so one of us was with our sons at virtually all times.
  Where the real problem comes in, is with poor life choices..a family cannot manage a two-parent income when there is only one parent.  Yes, tragically death can cut a marriage short.. but the choices I speak of, are the choices of  either not marrying (committing) at all and still producing offspring..or marrying a slacker.. who runs off and doesn't provide for the children he donated sperm for..

[mcwoodduck]

woodduck...that's not what I said...its what you think...All I said is there's a big difference in resources and choices between rural poor and city-urban poor....not really arguable.  If you live in the country and would like to meet some urban poor, just cut social service budgets to the bone, and I bet you will get to meet some of those folks sooner than later.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
...TM7

But that is exactly what you said.
I contend that the poor are the poor the difference between the city poor and the country poor is the differnence between liberals and conservitives.
The City poor have bought into the liberal notions that Government has to take care of them and will wait for a hand out.  The same programs designed to safe guard against problems are the very same programs that have caused the perpetual city poor.
The Country poor are more community oriented and help comes from the community, the church, the neighbors.
On the same notes you look at a city and see homeless, see waste that by law has to go into the dumpster rather than a soup kitchen.  But you do not see homeless in the country.  If you are homeless you head for a city where you have the best foraging and benefits.
I will aslo contend that the addition of new taxes and the increase of taxes are what have caused families to go from a single income to needing two incomes and causing the problems.  As we all know the poor do payu taxes in the form of higher prices, higher prices in the form of rent, transportation, food and clothing costs.  Clearly if you raise taxes you raise prices.
But you doing the typical liberal thing and pitting one group against another in this case city vs country.
Liberals have killed the working poor family.  Look at harlem it was a great community and then liberals came along and simply destroyed the place, turing it from a ghetto into a slum.  A ghetto is a neighborhood made up of a specific group.
Higher taxes, governmnet programs, and the liberal racism that the black and brown people are not able to take care of themselves and that the rich whites need to take care of them. 
 

[mcwoodduck]

TM7,
Clearly you do not understand taxes.  I will take the baby steps to get you to the same conclusion that higher taxes hurt the poor the most even if they are not directly paying them.
A business sees a tax as a cost of doing business.  As taxes increase, so do the costs in an elastic good.  In an inelastic good cost cutting measures are usually made or a substitution good is used.
So while 47% or more of the country does not pay federal income taxes directly to the government they do pay taxes as they consume goods. 
An elastic good is something you need and there is not an easy substitution for it.  Gasoline in your car.  If you need 15 gallons of fuel to go to and from work each week you will have to pay the price no matter what and other items will need to be cut from your budget.
An in elastic good is something that can be substituted easliy for a cheaper good.  Butter vs Margine.  This is where cost cutting comes in.  And the easest way to cut costs is to cut labor costs by reducing the workforce, by moving production to a lower cost (lower tax) area, by inovating, or by diversifying.  The first people you lay off are the unskilled workers, the poor.
Now with everyone, the higher prices go, the more work is needed to pay for the goods.  A stay at home mother is forced to have latch key kids to go out and work to pay the increasing costs of needed items.  I will not get into the latch key kids and juvinille obesity as well as the gang problems this creates.
An apartment building where rent was $400 a month and an increase in both property and income taxes to the owner could lead to either higher rents or in rent controled places the abadonment of the building and a slum is created where not enough profit is availabe to repair and keep up the building, the people that can afford to leave do so and move to nicer places.  The poorest are stuck in a building that only gets worse.
Do you now understand why I said that increasing taxes hurts  the poor the most even if they are not directy paying taxes?
Look at your own life you hire and fire people all the time based on costs.  Do I go out to eat? Hire a waiter, chef, cooks, butcher, grocer..... All the way to the farmer.  Or do I go back to that place, fire them.  If you knew that prices (your costs) were going to go up would you fire a bunch of people in your life?  Would the nice restaraunt get fired and the local pizza place get hired?  Would the dry cleaners get fired and the coin laundry get hired?  You see based on costs your demand for goods goes up and down.  If a Porsche was 2,000 instead of 150,000 would you get rid of the standard 15,000 Ford and buy a porsche?   If another employer wanted to pay you 20% more to change jobs would you?  Would you go back to your company and ask for a raise not to leave? Of course you would.  Companies are no different they look for the best cost value relationship.  Sometimes that includes raising prices due to an increase in costs and those price increases hurt the poor the most.
In typical liberal fasion you think that stealing from the rich helps the poor but it hurts them the most in the form of higher prices and few unskilled jobs to gain experience and prove your self to get a better job and move up.

[OldSchoolRanger]

I've been poor_ _ and I've been rich. Rich is definitely better...where ever you are.
..TM7

Amazing!!!!!!!!!!!!  I agree with TM7

[OldSchoolRanger]

I don't believe it, Powderman using something from CNN! I thought that was the Communist News Network.
GuzziJohn

Guzzi - You absolutely correct, it is!