The Poor Are Different

[Annie]

Not dumber, just different. I thought this interesting, since so many of the 'victims' of Katrina were poor:

http://www.janegalt.net/blog/archives/005450.html

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An opinion-ridden free-for-all
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September 09, 2005
silhouette3.JPG From the desk of Jane Galt:

The poor really are different

The post below is complicated, for some conservatives, by the fact that if the poor acted like the middle class, they wouldn't have problems like no credit or savings.

If poor people did just four things, the poverty rate would be a fraction of what it currently is. Those four things are:

1) Finish high school
2) Get married before having children
3) Have no more than two children
4) Work full time

These are things that 99% of middle class people take as due course. In addition, there's some pretty good evidence that many people who are poor have personality problems that substantially contribute to their poverty.

For example, people with a GED do not experience significant earnings improvement over people who have not graduated from high school. In this credential-mad world, this simply should not be. And it is true even though people with a GED are apparently substantially more intelligent than people without a GED.

How can this be? Even if the GED were totally worthless, available evidence seems to indicate that intelligence carries a premium in the labour market.

The best explanation seems to be that people with a GED (as a group) are smart people with poor impulse control. What intelligence giveth, a tendency to make bad decisions taketh away. Anyone who has spent any time mentoring or working with poor families is familar with the maddening sensation of watching someone you care about make a devastating decision that no middle class person in their right mind would ever assent to.

So I think that conservatives are right that many of the poor dig themselves in deeper. But conservatives tend to take a moralistic stance towards poverty that radically underestimates how much cultural context determines our ability to make good decisions.

Sure, I go to work every day, pay my bills on time, don't run a credit card balance and don't have kids out of wedlock because I am planning for my future. But I also do these things because my parents spent twenty or so years drumming a fear of debt, unemployment, and illegitimacy into my head. And if I announce to my friends that I've just decided not to go to work because it's a drag, they will look at me funny--and if I do it repeatedly, they may well shun me as a loser. If I can't get a house because I've screwed up my credit, middle class society will look upon me with pity, which is painful to endure. If I have a baby with no father in sight, my grandmother will cry, my mother will yell, and my colleagues will act a little odd at the sight of my swelling belly.

In other words, middle class culture is such that bad long-term decision making also has painful short-term consequences. This does not, obviously, stop many middle class people from becoming addicted to drugs, flagrantly screwing up at work, having children they can't take care of, and so forth. But on the margin, it prevents a lot of people from taking steps that might lead to bankruptcy and deprivation. We like to think that it's just us being the intrinsically worthy humans that we are, but honestly, how many of my nice middle class readers had the courage to drop out of high school and steal cars for a living?

I'm not really kidding. I mean, I don't know about the rest of you, but when I was eighteen, if my peer group had taken up swallowing razor blades I would have been happily killed myself trying to set a world record. And if they had thought school was for losers and the cool thing to do was to hang out all day listening to music and running dime bags for the local narcotics emporium, I would have been right there with them. Lucky for me, my peer group thought that the most important thing in the entire world was to get an ivy league diploma, so I went to Penn and ended up shilling for drug companies on my blog.

Maybe you were different. But think back to the times--and you know there were times--when trying to win the approval of your peers convinced you to do things that were stupid, wrong, or both. Remember what it felt like to be sixteen and skinny and maybe not as charming and self confident as others around you, and ask yourself if you'd really be able to withstand their derision in order to go to college--especially if you didn't even know anyone who'd ever been to college, or have any but the haziest idea of what one might do when one got out. Try to imagine deciding to get a BA when doing so means cutting yourself off from the only world you know and launching yourself into a scary new place where everyone's wealthier, better educated, and more assured than you are.

Or take a minute right now and try to imagine how your friends would react if you announced that you'd decided to quit work, have a baby, and go on welfare. They'd make you feel like an outsider, wouldn't they? And isn't that at least part of the reason that you don't step outside of any of the behavioural boundaries that the middle class has set for itself?

Bad peer groups, like good ones, create their own equilibrium. Doing things that prevent you from attaining material success outside the group can become an important sign off loyalty to the group, which of course just makes it harder to break out of a group, even if it is destined for prison and/or poverty. I think it is fine, even necessary, to recognize that these groups have value systems which make it very difficult for individual members to get a foothold on the economic ladder. But I think conservatives need to be a lot more humble about how easily they would break out of such groups if that is where they had happened to be born.

That leaves us in a rather awkward place, because while I don't agree with conservatives that the poor are somehow worse people than we are, I also don't agree with liberals that money is the answer. Money buys material goods, which are not really the biggest problem that most poor people in America have. And I don't know how you go about providing the things they're missing: the robust social networks, the educational and occupational opportunity, the ability to construct a long-term life instead of one that is lived day-to-day. I think that we should remove the barriers, like poor schools, that block achievement from without, but I don't know what to do about the equally powerful barriers that block it from within.

But I also don't think that the answer is to use those barriers as an excuse to wash our hands of the matter.
Posted by Jane Galt at September 9, 2005 03:58 PM

 

[Nuc]

My apologies to the Judeo-Christians on this board, but instead of the ten commandments in every courthouse and school (which would be OK) this would be even better:

"If poor people did just four things, the poverty rate would be a fraction of what it currently is. Those four things are:

1) Finish high school
2) Get married before having children
3) Have no more than two children
4) Work full time"

100% true and no possibility of disagreement from anybody! :chains: :funnyface :duh3:

 

[Adam's Apple]

Galt really honed in on the reality of the poor with that article. I could really identify with what she said, having been a past volunteer for organizations that work with the poor. There are so many factors that enter into the situation.

It does help when the children in the projects can get an education--and especially a higher education. This seems to break the cycle; and, in my opinion, the government programs that help the underprivileged get an education are the only ones that have made a difference in their lives. But as Galt pointed out, education often times does not prevent one from making bad decisions. For example, rich people who abuse the use of drugs and alcohol for entertainment purposes.

 

[no1tovote4]

Having been poor in the past, I can tell you that most of what he stated is true. Those that are still there have their "GED" but never did finish HS.

 

[Said1]

The article is pretty good, but as adults, we need to ask how we are contributing to our sitution presently.

 

[rtwngAvngr]

The article is pretty good, but as adults, we need to ask how we are contributing to our sitution presently.

Yes. "What have you done for me lately?", the female perspective. Thanks, Said!

 

[dmp]

My apologies to the Judeo-Christians on this board, but instead of the ten commandments in every courthouse and school (which would be OK) this would be even better:

"If poor people did just four things, the poverty rate would be a fraction of what it currently is. Those four things are:

2) Get married before having children


100% true and no possibility of disagreement from anybody! :chains: :funnyface :duh3:

...N.O.W. would dissagree. NOW believes single mothers are JUST as capable as a father-mother parenting team.

 

[dilloduck]

The article is pretty good, but as adults, we need to ask how we are contributing to our sitution presently.

Agreed--according to the article it appears as though the poor ARE poor due to personality problems and peer pressure. The 4 principles to escaping poverty appear sound and would most likely would help a person succeed yet isn't the problem that peer pressure and personality problems prevent the poor from adopting these principals of success?

I don't think it's a moral judgement to say that the poor have actually adapted to being poor and are willing to settle for less. Welfare keeps them above the depravity level that might motivate them to adopt the 4 principles of success. They, thier parents and thier peers have all discovered what many others with different upbringing have not. You can eat, be housed, be clothed and receive medical care from the government with minimal amount of work. All of you friends do it so where is the sense of shame and where is the desire to escape?

 

[dmp]

From a friend via email:

A very lucid portrayal of what my wife and I have discussed repeatedly in the past.

I agree with what Jane says 100%.

My wife's brother is a prime example. He got into drugs at around 13 years of age and started hanging out with the 'wrong' crowd. He dropped out of school, had a kid out of wedlock, had to move into Section 8 housing in the 'ghetto', and just recently got a halfway decent job. Unfortunately he completely rejects middle class society and prefers living in the 'ghetto' as this is what is comfortable for him. He considers normal, middle class people to be 'fake'. I doubt he'll ever rise above it.

He believes that everyone owes him something. I paid for both him and his wife to go to a local community college and get their GEDs. We babysat our niece so that they could complete the course. We hoped getting their GED would help them realize their own potential. We got not so much as a 'thank you' from them for our help.

State sponsored welfare is a blight. I really wish we could get back to a 'workfare' program like FDRs New Deal. Lord knows we have plenty of public works projects that need to be done in order to improve the state of our country's infrastructure. This would condition people to expect to have to work, either for the government, or elsewhere, and would hopefully give them a skill. The way it is now, we just create more 'poor' people. But I digress...

I consider myself another example. I grew up fairly poor. We never starved mind you, but I can remember times when my father was laid off from work and we stood in line for our 'government cheese' and used food stamps to survive. My parents were also on Section 8 from time to time when work was scarce. The difference being, my parents wanted to work, and pulled us out of our situation.

I didn't have examples from my peer group to show me going to college was a good thing. I was most interested in finding a job and working hard, as that was the only life I was shown. Through my hard work and determination I managed to get hired on at Boeing in late 1996. I could have had my college paid for at that time, but I still considered college a waste of time. The problem was, I knew plenty of people that I felt I was as smart as, or smarter than, who had gone to college. I couldn't see a good reason to go.

In late 1999, I was laid off and had the opportunity to have 1.5 years of college paid for while receiving unemployment compensation. I jumped at the chance and treated college like a job. I figured if the state was going to pay for me to go to school, I might as well work hard and excel in my studies. I finished 122 credit hours (~25 classes) of college in 6 quarters and earned a 3.99 GPA.

I'm now making 100% more than when I was laid off from Boeing, and 300% more than I was making at the job I had prior to Boeing. I don't think college is worthless anymore, but it took the correct circumstances to make me understand. FWIW, I met my wife because I went to college. One tends to meet quality people there, much like one would at church.

Being in college exposed me to a different class of people. I now find myself unable to relate with many of my old friends and sometimes even my family over common issues in life. It's hard not to see the things they do as huge mistakes. It really isn't their fault, they were just raised that way. I try to talk them into going to school all the time. I've seen first-hand how going to college can change people - for the better.

On the subject of credit and other issues:

I see alot of intelligent, middle class people falling into the debt trap lately. I think we're going to see many families fall into the 'poor' category in short order if the economy tanks. Hopefully they can pull themselves out.

Thanks for reading my rambling thoughts.

 

[manu1959]

...N.O.W. would dissagree. NOW believes single mothers are JUST as capable as a father-mother parenting team.

my mom was....raised two kids that went to university and are now partners in their respective firms

 

[dmp]

my mom was....raised two kids that went to university and are now partners in their respective firms

...but a single parent household isn't the 'ideal'.

 

[GotZoom]

my mom was....raised two kids that went to university and are now partners in their respective firms

She and your family are the exception to the rule.

A very good thing for all of you.

 

[Jimmyeatworld]

...but a single parent household isn't the 'ideal'.

I'll agree with that, it isn't the ideal situation. I don't think any woman who dreams of raising a family dreams of doing it on her own. However, every situation is going to be different. I come from a single parent household, but I think it was different than most.

My mother was 27 by the time she had me, so it's not like a 20 or 21 year old woman with two kids. My mother never went on any kind of welfare. She worked long hours to make it, even working two jobs for awhile back in the 70s (thanks a lot Carter). She also had help. My grandmother and uncle were around, so she didn't have to do it totally by herself.

Point is, we made it without food stamps and we made it without government assistance of any kind. We were not the wealthiest people on the block, but we did okay. Today, I have to say I'm not doing bad for myself. I own my own home, have two vehicles, I help my mother with her bills, and still have savings. One thing I am impressed by is how my mother was able to to all she did back then, making about a third of what I make now.

We weren't the "ideal" household, but I also recognize that we probably weren't the average household when it comes to single parent families.

 

[Adam's Apple]

My situation was somewhat similar to yours, Jimmyeatworld, but we were raised by a "single" mother because our dad was away from home so much on his job. He came home on Friday evening after work and left early Monday morning before we were up. All six of us turned out fine and are largely products of our mother, although it was our dad who put food on the table, clothed us, and enabled us to have a roof over our heads.

I am currently reading Founding Mothers by Cokie Roberts, and am learning that America had a lot of "single" mothers who took care of everything while their husbands were either away fighting in some war or meeting together to sever the ties with the Brits and found our own country. However, the men were home long enough to produce many, many children. Maybe there was no birth control in the 1700s.

 

[NATO AIR]

I agree with this painfully true article.

I know that this might not fly in many households these days thanks to the anti-military hysteria gripping the nation over recruiting, but the military does a whole lot of good for the poor.

My mother was dirt-poor with two children and an abusive husband and joining the Army in the 70's changed her life for the much better... 25 years of service later, she is in the middle class, happily married and has two exceptional kids who are now highly successful adults and one knucklehead kid in the Navy...

I can think of many other people I have met in my life who jumped out of poverty by joining the military.

Not to exclusively focus on it, but the military and other forms of national service may be (along with guaranteed access to good education) the two best methods to help the poor.

 

[CSM]

I agree with this painfully true article.

I know that this might not fly in many households these days thanks to the anti-military hysteria gripping the nation over recruiting, but the military does a whole lot of good for the poor.

My mother was dirt-poor with two children and an abusive husband and joining the Army in the 70's changed her life for the much better... 25 years of service later, she is in the middle class, happily married and has two exceptional kids who are now highly successful adults and one knucklehead kid in the Navy...

I can think of many other people I have met in my life who jumped out of poverty by joining the military.

Not to exclusively focus on it, but the military and other forms of national service may be (along with guaranteed access to good education) the two best methods to help the poor.

In some circles, suggesting the military as a way out of poverty is akin to suggesting genocide!

 

[NATO AIR]

In some circles, suggesting the military as a way out of poverty is akin to suggesting genocide!

I can only look at those folks and say " "

 

[dmp]

I tell ya - you're right on the ball with Military or other Service as a ticket out of poverty for some people.

Actually, One can Thank or Blame the Army for me being alive/born in the first place.

My father left Kentucky at age 17, back in 1959, where he'd grown up. There were years my Grandfather made less than $100. 9 Kids and VERY low income meant a foggy future for my dad. For him, the Army was better than home - he'd be assured 3 hots and a cot every day. After his tour in Alaska, the Army sent him to Fort Lewis - where he eventually met and married my mother.



For ME, growing up in lower-middle class the Army provided a stepping stone to my eventual career. While I'm still probably lower-middle to middle class, I bet had I not enlisted, I'd be struggling to make rent - much less make mortgages, truck payments, and junk.