Vent: Crappy Monday

[Junsui]

There are people in the US who know how to do that as well, but the cost of living can be expensive in some places.

[vashti]

Minimum wage won't even come close to putting a roof over your head in Los Angeles - not even a crappy apartment - let alone buy food for yourself and a family. Very frequently multiple families share apartments so they can make ends meet.

Not all Americans lack discipline, and despite popular world opinion, there really ARE poor people living here, and our streets are not paved in gold. We have a very large population of working poor. What is vanishing is the middle class, not the poor.

And by the way, a body also needs protein to be healthy.
:-)

[Junsui]

Yeah, what Vashti said.

[Mish]

Minimum wage won't even come close to putting a roof over your head in Los Angeles - not even a crappy apartment - let alone buy food for yourself and a family. Very frequently multiple families share apartments so they can make ends meet.

Not all Americans lack discipline, and despite popular world opinion, there really ARE poor people living here, and our streets are not paved in gold. We have a very large population of working poor. What is vanishing is the middle class, not the poor.

And by the way, a body also needs protein to be healthy.
:-)

There is plenty of protein available in cheaper foods than meat... But even meat can be rationed off if one isn't fusy with what they eat

Americans who do not lack descipline and know how to ration their resources are ussually not part of the poor communities.

Los Angeles is too Posch of a place for people living on a minimum wage to survive in. This is why the poorer people ussually choose cities with lower living expenses or live on the outskirts of the city or cheap districts. Take Sydney for example, yes it's very expensive to live where I live, but If i was to move west for example the costs of living would fall by more than 50% There are plenty of jobs in the west and cost of living are very affordable even for minimum waged workers (Affordable Especially in comparison to some other countries, like Estonia)...

Once again, it all comes down to descipline. Chances benefit people from overseas, that they will overlook the extras that Americans are used to since childhood and therefore take for granted, and will stick with bare essentials for living until they are well up on their feet.

[Junsui]

Not every American is used to extras since childhood.

[Mish]

Not every. But try comparing average US lifestyle to average Estonian lifestyle and you will see where I am going with this

[Junsui]

I know what you're trying to say. I'm just saying not everyone in the US has all of these luxuries and just throws money everywhere.

[Mish]

Compared to people in developing and Third World countries they are...

And this can be seen in the littlest and minutest forms (E.g. throwing away food that can still be eaten, wasting water, buying things like toppings and dressings, buying rewards for self, getting things not neccessary for survival, having a choice of employment - even minimum wage labour, but choosing not to work because they see themselves as above that compared to people in other countries which do not even have an opportunity to work in any kind of a job so they can't even recieve a monetary gain) I can add millions of these differentialities to things considered as normal that we take for granted, which others don't...

[vashti]

I agree in general with you Mishayna, that the majority of people in western countries have more than they need. I guess my only objection is to the idea that true poverty doesn't exist here in America, which is untrue. But maybe that is not what you were trying to say.

[Mish]

I agree in general with you Mishayna, that the majority of people in western countries have more than they need. I guess my only objection is to the idea that true poverty doesn't exist here in America, which is untrue. But maybe that is not what you were trying to say.

Yes, I was talking more about people from overseas still seeing US as a dreamland because of their more evolved adoptaion skills, due to living in extremely harsh conditions of developing/3 rd World...

I agree with you Tanya, there is a lot of poverty in US, due to a centuries old discrimination system that favours White Americans over other minorities such as Native Americans... Some places in US can be compared to the 3rd world, the differences are more cultural and discrimination is more often over the ethnic lines than the social status. Whereas, an Estonian man in US would be just another white guy blending in with the crowd, with more westernized cultural similarities to a US citizen than let's say a US citizen to a Native American living in US in the wild...

[Junsui]

I wasn't arguing about third world countries having it worse. Just saying what shh has been saying.

[misombra]

you know that in the u.s the top 10% wealthy own 90% of our wealth. i think the world only sees the gluttany and greed of that 10% and thinks that all americans are like that.

but our poor still have more than someone starving in the third world. i would be considered poor here in the u.s but i'm hella rich compared to most people in the world.

[whaywardj]

Yes, I was talking more about people from overseas still seeing US as a dreamland because of their more evolved adoptaion skills, due to living in extremely harsh conditions of developing/3 rd World...

I agree with you Tanya, there is a lot of poverty in US, due to a centuries old discrimination system that favours White Americans over other minorities such as Native Americans... Some places in US can be compared to the 3rd world, the differences are more cultural and discrimination is more often over the ethnic lines than the social status. Whereas, an Estonian man in US would be just another white guy blending in with the crowd, with more westernized cultural similarities to a US citizen than let's say a US citizen to a Native American living in US in the wild...

Uh...I imagine everyone here knows the largest tangible exports of the US are agricultural goods and raw and recyclable materials. Or were a couple of years ago. Exceeding even exports of weapons systems. (Which exportations, incidentally, go handily to explain much of US foreign policy.) Last time I looked, a country whose major exports were raw materials and agricultural goods was, almost by definiton, a Third World country.

[whaywardj]

PS: Many times, I wonder whether the last great American Depression ever really ended and whether financial wizards didn't just give an appearance of it ending by promoting revolving credit...which debt is coming home to roost now. (What we call the Depression, btw, was orginally called a "crisis." Politicians of the time spun it to the softer euphemism postehaste....before any among the American public even knew the concept of "spin" existed, trusting in our government as we did then.)

[whaywardj]

...Los Angeles is too Posch of a place for people living on a minimum wage to survive in....

Uh...that would be p-o-s-h, Mishanya. "P-ort O-ut; S-tarboard H-ome." During the heyday of ocean lliners departing south from Europe, only the rich could afford to change suites so in order to keep the coast line in view.

Can you imagine what word another nautical phrase, "Ship High In Transit," became?

The interetsing thing about this thread is that everyone is discussing the topic through the luxury of an internet connection. Imagine all the oil-related commodities it takes for each of us to enjoy that privilege, we in the West, already are beginning to consider is a utility, just like electricity; which was also, once, a luxury entirely and still is to most in the world. Considerable cultural arrogance is afoot in that. What's the latest number? The US consumes 25% of the world's energy resources? Something like that?