View Full Version : So what can you do about
flowerseverywhere
5-19-16, 7:42am
I read here very few days and what strikes me is the lack of positive solutions to obvious problemss.
For instance Student Loans resulting in training that will not lead to a high paying job. Borrowing money to be a physician, engineer, nurse for instance has a good possibility of being a good gamble. For many other degrees, not so much. Day after day I see posts here, on Facebook, in media articles talking about ridiculous sums, ridiculous interest rates and so on but griping on social media won't effect change. What can you do to change this? Why are we allowing our government to charge such high note rest rates when we can barely get 1% interest at a bank. Something is wrong here.
there are multiple other examples. Limiting access to poor women's health care, more dominance of monoculture seeds, Flint water.
What at can you do to influence change? I read several forums and through Facebook I continue to be surprised at the lack of solutions.
Chamge can heppen. But it won't as long as we let those in charge of the money make more over the best interests of the population.
For example, if I I feel strongly about something, I email, call and hand write letters to my representatives. There is a network of people out there who save seeds and garden organically. I know an organization that raises money to give kids scholarships to trade schools. And so on.
What action can you take to better some of the wrongs that exist today?
We need a lot more of those "social justice warriors" people like to snark about, I guess. History is replete with examples of blood shed and gains hard won by those heroes--from the American Revolution to Stonewall and beyond.
Like you, I contact my congressional representatives, send money, vote, and so on. I've marched--the last time protesting war in the Middle East. You can see how much good that did. People are trying--the March on Wall Street and Black Lives Matter are proof of that--but I get the sense that people are discouraged, that the establishment machine is too big/entrenched to fight, that it has embedded all kinds of safeguards to defend itself, that the deck is stacked. Also, most people are too busy and tired working 60-hour weeks to protest. And few of us are willing to put our lives/careers on the line.
Now, I just funnel money to causes that are important to me, and hope it does some good.
I went to a People's Meeting last night, a teacher at my school is very active in the teacher's union and I got invited by her. It was wonderful and maddening but I think that is going to be my action. There are big issues in my school district. The teacher turnover rate is huge, even the principal voluntary turnover is high.We have reformers buying the schools basically, the charters are not bound by the standards of other schools, their administrators do not need a principal license and the teachers have no pay protection based on accepted standards and no limits on how much work they are required to do. I interviewed at one charter school and they told me I was required to work evenings and weekends to support school activities. Our superintendent talks about too much testing and we just had a 3 week block when kids in elementary school were testing in addition to other tests during the year, none of which was available to the teachers in time to make instructional changes. They get the test scores the beginning of next year. However I heard from one organization last night that they got the district to make changes in adding more restorative practices in schools to address the school to prison pipeline.
So the group is going to work on voting out the school board members and getting new ones. Some of the action steps were to develop some strong candidates. I have urgency to change things for the kids I work with, and to make things better for my own grandchildren. I could see myself working a lot more in politics, around education in specifics. I don't know what to do about the economy issues, vote on all levels and ask hard questions of candidates. My kids and the people their age have it hard. I am sick of the statements saying that young people and poor are just not working hard enough.
I did post on my FB that I don't want to donate a $1 to feed hungry kids, I want to change things so that working families can feed their kids and work one job.
I did post on my FB that I don't want to donate a $1 to feed hungry kids, I want to change things so that working families can feed their kids and work one job.
On Altruism:
"Rather than asking how individual consumers can guarantee the basic sustenance of millions of people, we should be questioning an economic system that only halts misery and starvation if it is profitable. Rather than solely creating an individualized “culture of giving,” we should be challenging capitalism’s institutionalized taking."
Jacobin Magazine
Something to think about.
I did post on my FB that I don't want to donate a $1 to feed hungry kids, I want to change things so that working families can feed their kids and work one job.
SO many issues out there that I can not change. But this statement is how I feel also sadly:( There is so much supplemental help out there. WHY are the kids hungry? Did the parent spend the supplemental help on "what". OK I feel so badly for the kids, my heart pains, BUT why is this even happening, who is checking on how the help is being spent? Our local school district feeds every child breakfast no questions asked and there are many well do families.
( I have been out of the school age kids for 12 years so I was amazed at this, I asked one well to do in our neighborhood if her kids took this. She said yes they just run in and grab a pop tart and juice. They don't even think about it)
Since a high percent qualify for free lunches and reduced fees, the district is allowed the free breakfast. That leaves dinner? If the families qualify for school free breakfast and lunches then the families would get help for food?? I won;t even go on my rant about the over weight families I see using the cards. I would starve and be a toothpick if it meant putting the little food on my child's plate.
Ok sorry for my rant and this will not be well received I imagine.
Williamsmith
5-19-16, 10:02am
You ask about many things that are directly a result of the way we allow money to be used. This election cycle with Bernie and Donald and the status quo Hillary, what's it about? boil it down and a lot of people are saying, "Why are private bankers running our monetary policy, paying off our elected officials, using us to bailout risky adventures. " Because everybody like easy money, even if it isn't worth anything and represents nothing.
Change will come. When we have a new recession followed by a depression and real outrage. What is happening now is simply a disinterest. Too many of us participate in the scam hoping it is real enough to get us by. The Federal Reserve counterfeiting scam will end but it will be a slow death. We are at zero interest now. Negative interest follows and so does the unknown. We will find out what Lost In Space , living in a world turned upside down means. It means something like being robbed on a street corner by a man who stuffs money in your pockets.
iris lilies
5-19-16, 10:08am
I did post on my FB that I don't want to donate a $1 to feed hungry kids, I want to change things so that working families can feed their kids and work one job.
SO many issues out there that I can not change. But this statement is how I feel also sadly:( There is so much supplemental help out there. WHY are the kids hungry? Did the parent spend the supplemental help on "what". OK I feel so badly for the kids, my heart pains, BUT why is this even happening, who is checking on how the help is being spent? Our local school district feeds every child breakfast no questions asked and there are many well do families.
( I have been out of the school age kids for 12 years so I was amazed at this, I asked one well to do in our neighborhood if her kids took this. She said yes they just run in and grab a pop tart and juice. They don't even think about it)
Since a high percent qualify for free lunches and reduced fees, the district is allowed the free breakfast. That leaves dinner? If the families qualify for school free breakfast and lunches then the families would get help for food?? I won;t even go on my rant about the over weight families I see using the cards. I would starve and be a toothpick if it meant putting the little food on my child's plate.
Ok sorry for my rant and this will not be well received I imagine.
I agree with you ctg, if there really is hunger in children, WHY is that after all of the government programs weve thrown at the problem?
i realize that "food insecurity" is the latest darling of above referenced keyboard social justice warriors but I distrust the premise.
[COLOR=#333333]... I won;t even go on my rant about the over weight families I see using the cards. I would starve and be a toothpick if it meant putting the little food on my child's plate.
Ok sorry for my rant and this will not be well received I imagine.
Overweight is often a product of a cheap, starchy diet. Like juice and Pop Tarts. Also, genetics.
catherine
5-19-16, 10:35am
I agree with you ctg, if there really is hunger in children, WHY is that after all of the government programs weve thrown at the problem?
i realize that "food insecurity" is the latest darling of above referenced keyboard social justice warriors but I distrust the premise.
It's a very complex issue. This is from the Hunger-Free America (http://www.hungerfreeamerica.org) website, the organization my daughter worked for as a graphic designer.
This organization has a multi-pronged approach: it advocates for food policy, provides an umbrella for many food banks in NY and provides direct assistance and support to needy families. I know the director personally and he is an impassioned crusader for his clients and the short-term as well as the long-term challenges that are faced in this area.
Hunger in New York City
Sadly, the need for the New York City Coalition Against Hunger is greater than ever, with the city facing an increasing crisis of poverty and hunger. in the 2012-2014 time frame, over 1.4 million New Yorkers - including nearly one in four of the city's children - lived in households that lacked sufficient food.
In the Coalition's latest annual survey of hunger in New York City - the most comprehensive of its kind - New York City’s emergency food providers (food pantries, soup kitchens, and brown bag programs) reported a 5 percent increase in need for their services, on top of a 7 percent increase in 2014, 10 percent in 2013, 5 percent in 2012, 12 percent in 2011, 7 percent in 2010, and 20 percent in 2009. These findings are only exacerbated by recent cuts in federal nutrition.
Summary of Findings: 2015 Annual Hunger Survey
Nearly half of all working-age New York State and New York City residents who can’t afford enough food live in households where at least one person is employed. In both the state and city, the minimum wage is now $8.75 per hour, equaling $15,925 for a year of full-time work, leaving a worker with even one child below the federal poverty line.
Many New Yorkers are paid at or near the minimum wage – and significant numbers are even illegally paid below that. As a result, in 2012-2014, one million New York State residents lived in households that included at least one person working but food insecure or, in other words, were unable to afford enough food. Of the adults between the ages of 15 and 65 in the state who were food insecure, 47% were working.
In New York City alone in 2012-2014, more than 450,000 residents lived in food insecure households that included at least one person working. Forty-eight percent of all adults between 15 and 65 in the city who were food insecure were employed.
I agree with you ctg, if there really is hunger in children, WHY is that after all of the government programs weve thrown at the problem?
i realize that "food insecurity" is the latest darling of above referenced keyboard social justice warriors but I distrust the premise.
I think the problem lies in the fact that everyone who needs help don't always ask /look for it. If kids are going to bed hungry, it's probably more a case of single mom working a low wage job and too proud to ask for help. Or doesn't think she qualifies...or has been shamed for not being able to feed her kids properly. Non of these the gov. fault, or because they didn't try. It's just what it is I'm afraid. there are always going to be folks too proud or unwilling to accept help. Or don't think they really need 'help'...they just need to get to the next pay check in a few days. Not worth going through the hassle of seeking help (and it really is a hassle. There really isn't a free lunch without jumping through hoops)
You also have just plain ignorance. Lots of folks have no idea how to boil water, much less make a pot of beans or whatever. Give them all a crock pot and a bag of beans and they will still go hungry. I love the idea of all kids just having breakfast and lunch at school. Doesn't really cost that much to society, and these kids will have at least two meals a day. Enough to sustain them even if they do have proud/ignorant parents.
For solution, I think education is still the key. Education in practical skills, cooking, shopping, etc... Again, give them each a crock pot and a bag of beans and teach them how to use both. Unfortunately, as the old saying goes, you can lead a horse to water... But we all know, and has been demonstrated many times here, you can eat well, and healthy on a fairly small budget. Granted most here incorporate gardening skills, which might be stretching it a bit for lots, but even with all purchased food, it can be done.
Of course, you get into the food desert problem, but that just simply needs to be dealt with. You can't make people open a store in a neighborhood they don't want to. I suppose the gov could run a grocery in the neighborhoods as a non profit type thing, like a military commissary.
As far as higher education goes, I try to talk up the value of trade school and apprenticeship programs as much as I can. The high schools need to update their thinking. They still push the 4 year college degree as the only/best tract to success. It isn't. Parents need to be told that. Unless their kid wants to be a doctor, nurse, that type, a 4 year degree isn't necessary. Or even practical, considering how much they will spend for an average income. Unfortunately, too many careers demand a degree to even step in the door. Careers that you could learn all you need to know by apprenticeship or at most a 2 year technical school.
catherine
5-19-16, 11:57am
I think the problem lies in the fact that everyone who needs help don't always ask /look for it. If kids are going to bed hungry, it's probably more a case of single mom working a low wage job and too proud to ask for help. Or doesn't think she qualifies...or has been shamed for not being able to feed her kids properly. Non of these the gov. fault, or because they didn't try. It's just what it is I'm afraid. there are always going to be folks too proud or unwilling to accept help. Or don't think they really need 'help'...they just need to get to the next pay check in a few days. Not worth going through the hassle of seeking help (and it really is a hassle. There really isn't a free lunch without jumping through hoops)
You also have just plain ignorance. Lots of folks have no idea how to boil water, much less make a pot of beans or whatever. Give them all a crock pot and a bag of beans and they will still go hungry. I love the idea of all kids just having breakfast and lunch at school. Doesn't really cost that much to society, and these kids will have at least two meals a day. Enough to sustain them even if they do have proud/ignorant parents.
Well said. In addition to the pride issues, sometimes it's more of acute problems rather than chronic, because of urgent needs upsetting the apple cart. So maybe Mrs. X can afford to feed the kids on a normal day, but then her car breaks down or there's a medical emergency or something else that sends the "budget" into a tailspin.
I know it's hard for people who have experienced solid middle-class upbringings to fully understand the daily lives of the have-nots, and while the solutions seem simple: "Why can't they just cook rice and beans?" or "why can't they just buy in bulk" or "why can't they look ahead?" in reality life is shaped by survival mode, which changes how you approach every day life.
I read this article right after one about Governor Brownback of Kansas cutting back on, and further modifying welfare. Nothing really excuses what she did, but it clearly screams desperation:
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/texas-mom-denied-food-stamps-shoots-children-kills-welfare-office-article-1.988127
Like the man who shot his elderly wife because he couldn't afford her medication (at least that was his story). There are a lot of desperate people out there.
I am going to take some authority on this one based on my work which I consider fairly front line to the issues of food insecurity and assistance. I see very few people who when given a reasonable option regularly choose junk food for their kids. Education is important however more people than you would think are aware of the nutritional needs of their children. There are of course some that choose more junk food, however when we put out a veggie tray at a family night or provide a snack of fresh fruit the kids all take them, the parents appreciate it as well. The homeless families I have worked with in my school often take extra food we offer but can only take 1-2 days worth of food that does not need refrigeration. I know this because I have built a trusting relationship where they can tell me what the issues are they need help with. They are more than willing to provide paperwork and information for lunches and other services, sometimes they struggle to keep track of the paperwork based on their housing situation.
My mom volunteers and is on the board for a food bank, she is seeing that they give away pretty much everything and have to impose limits on how much people can take. She has seen in upsurge in adjunct professors using the food bank and people who have masters degrees which leads back to the issue of where the money is actually going in colleges. I have heard some great results from programs that work with farmer's markets. The food stamp allowance is worth double so families can afford a lot more there. But still food banks should be used for that case where you have an unexpected crisis, not a way of life for people who work full time.
Great book for learning more is http://www.bookholders.com/search.asp?mode=query&query=9781929229482&type=isbn&ref=adwords Ruby Payne - A framework for understanding poverty. It gets into the survival skills of poverty, middle class and affluent groups in a clear way.
Teacher Terry
5-19-16, 3:03pm
ZG: more colleges are hiring adjuncts because they can pay them very little $ such as 2500.00 per class/semester. Our local newspaper had a write up about how little money these people were making even when they were teaching 4-5 classes semester. these people either had Master's or PhD's. In 1990 I was working on my MSW and spent a semester helping a food program distribute lunches during the summer to kids in low income neighborhoods. We would take the cold lunches to the school and the kids would come. If an adult accompanied them they could not eat and no food could be taken off site. We never knew how many kids would show up per day and at which school so spent much time driving extra lunches from school to school. You would see kids age 10 bringing their younger siblings and often walking quite a long way for a cold lunch that consisted of milk, a piece of fruit and a cold sandwich. Only one kid was ever accompanied by an adult. The clothes they wore were often in terrible shape so all summer long I collected kids clothes from my house and my friends to give away. Then I would see the kids wearing the clothes. This was a town of about 80,000 in Wis and mostly a blue collar town. Most of my friends then were in the skilled trades and totally against helping the poor. This was an eye opening summer. This was before free school lunches and a few teachers told me they would keep boxes of cereal to feed kids bought at their own expense because if a kid is hungry they can't concentrate. I never did learn anything about these kid's families.
On Altruism:
"Rather than asking how individual consumers can guarantee the basic sustenance of millions of people, we should be questioning an economic system that only halts misery and starvation if it is profitable. Rather than solely creating an individualized “culture of giving,” we should be challenging capitalism’s institutionalized taking."
Jacobin Magazine
Something to think about.
+1,000
so very tired of begging our representatives to do the right thing.
Gardenarian
5-20-16, 1:52pm
"Often in my lectures when I use the phrase "white supremacist capitalist patriarchy" to describe our nation's political system, audiences laugh. No one has ever explained why accurately naming this system is funny. The laughter itself is a weapon of patriarchal terrorism." - Bell Hooks
Yes, the problems are systemic. You can't fight the system alone; you can't change everything all at once. But you can make a difference.
I think you have to choose a cause that speaks to you, and fight for it as best you can. Don't expose yourself to negativity. Keep your focus on one thing.
Get involved in local politics (or national), save a tree in your neighborhood, educate kids about college finances, volunteer at a homeless shelter, seed bomb, protest, guerilla garden.
Ultralight
5-20-16, 1:53pm
bell hooks is amazing!
Miss Cellane
5-20-16, 2:02pm
Not that long ago, I spent two years unemployed. I supported myself with a part-time retail job and temp work, lots and lots of temp work. These are some of the things I learned.
1. A full-time retail job, even at a bit over minimum wage, is not enough to support one adult in my area. (That's with sharing an apartment with a roommate, driving a 10 year old car, necessary in an area with limited public transportation, and no "frills," like cable TV.) I made a lot more money temping, but it wasn't always steady work. Thus, the retail job for a bit of steady income, and the temping to make any actual money. I was offered a full-time job at the store, but when I did the math, it made a lot more sense to continue to work the two jobs--retail schedules are so erratic that fitting in a part-time job to supplement that income would have been very difficult.
2. Cooking healthy meals from scratch is good. Cooking a healthy dinner from scratch when you have been working 13 hour days, five days in a row, and are getting home on the 6th day at 7 pm after 8.5 hours on your feet being nice to customers who are not always nice back? Well, your feet hurt, so you don't want to stand for very long. You are exhausted, and hungry, and you need to get to bed in three hours so you can get up and do it all over again the next day. You haven't had a day completely off from both jobs in 4 weeks and your brain is fried. Eating fast food takes 5 minutes through the drive-through, and you are fed. It is not a good choice. It is not a choice I made often. But I completely understand why someone would make that choice and I can't blame them.
Yes, I tried to make big batches of food and freeze it. Did this a lot, actually. But a month of non-stop work and the frozen food would be gone, and I had to make choices as to how best to use my free time--laundry? food shopping? cooking? napping? contacting all the people in my life I simply had not time for? getting out for a walk in the fresh air? a little housework, like cleaning the bathroom or changing the sheets? There were months on end when my "free time" was an afternoon, twice a month. There's only so much you can pack into that time, especially when you are seemingly permanently tired.
And if you don't have your own washer and dryer, laundry becomes a very time-consuming chore. If you don't have a good stove, cooking is harder. Lots of low-income people rent, and have no say in the appliances they use in their homes. You might have a small refrigerator with a tiny freezer, limiting the amount of food you can make ahead. Your oven might not work.
3. Retail schedules. I'm guessing this goes for fast food word schedules, as well. There is absolutely no consistency, day to day or week to week, as to when you work. You are always working over a meal time. 10 am to 2:30 pm? That includes lunch time for most people I know. But it's a short enough shift that, in my state at least, there is no break. So when do you eat? Hold off on breakfast until 9 am and eat just before you leave for work? Eat at your normal 6:30 am and have a snack at 9? And when you eat lunch at 3 or 3:30, it throws off your dinner schedule, because you aren't going to be hungry at your usual 6:30 dinner time.
I have no proof, but I do wonder if these sorts of schedules have an effect on people's weight. There's never an opportunity to get into a set schedule for meals. You are always grabbing a snack to tide you over. You may have to eat when you are not hungry, because you are scheduled for a meal break at a specific time and your manager insists you go to eat then. Or you spend several hours being hungry, because you don't get a break during your shift.
4. Sometimes you have to make choices about buying food or fixing the 10 year old car that is the lifeline that gets you to work. Without the car, you can't work, in areas with little or no public transportation.
You learn to make the choice that solves the most pressing problem now. Even if it means paying out the rent money for new tires. You need to have that car--you will worry about the rent in two weeks when it is due.
You aren't always thinking clearly. You are just trying to solve the current crisis so you can move on to the next one.
5. You don't always make good choices when you are tired. Working for weeks on end without a day off is not good for you. And you may make what seems like a good decision at the time. Months later, you wonder how that idea even came into your head. Someone who is working two or more jobs just to make ends meet is probably tired and burned out. And not making the best choices, because burn out does funny things to your mind.
But taking a day off to rest up is risky. If you don't go in to the temp job on Saturday, when they are offering overtime to get the project done, will that be a black mark against you the next time that company is looking for temps? You like working there, the pay is good, you need the money. Instead of taking that Saturday off, that Saturday you have been looking forward to for weeks, because it is the first weekend day that you haven't been scheduled for the retail job in months, you smile and go to the temp job. When the retail job calls at 5 pm, just as you are leaving the temp job, and tells you there was a call-out for the 6-9:30 shift and can you come in? You remember that people who don't accommodate requests like this get the crummy shifts, and you smile and you forget about your evening plans of cooking dinner and doing laundry and getting to bed early, and you go to work. You eat a peanut butter sandwich in the car on the way there. When you get home at 10 pm, you hand wash some underwear (because the apartment building laundry room closes at 10 pm), pack tomorrow's lunch and dinner (because it's a two job day), and fall into bed, having done pretty much nothing all day but work.
6. I met a lot of people who got food stamps and WIC, free lunches for their kids, medical care for their kids and themselves. Some of whom were afraid to look for permanent, full-time jobs, because they knew they could not make enough money at a job to replace the level of health care that their kids got--and needed. Free lunch in our town allows families to get $10 a month internet service, to help with the kids' homework. Food stamps make you eligible for a free smart phone with a very low cost monthly fee (otherwise, many people would have no phone at all). They don't like the temping/retail work lifestyle, but they can't see a realistic way out of it that doesn't leave their family worse off than before.
My feeling is that if you have a full-time job, or two part-time jobs, you really ought be able to support yourself. But the wages in the US don't allow for this, and that's not even considering the expenses of living in areas like NYC or San Francisco. And I don't think people should have to work themselves into exhaustion just to pay rent and put food on the table. I met many people who could have worked at much "better" jobs, but they were too run down from the work load to have the time or energy to job hunt. Or they had been so beaten down by life that they were convinced that what they were doing was the best they could possibly do.
A lot of these jobs take a physical toll on the body. Bad backs, bad knees--these were rampant. The human body was not meant to spend 8-10 hours a day standing and walking on concrete floors. People went home in pain. People took double and triple the recommended doses of over-the-counter pain killers just to get through a shift. Even the full-timers, who had health insurance, couldn't afford the doctor's visits to get these problems treated. (It was apparently crummy health insurance.)
I made it through and now have a permanent, full-time job. And I am doing everything possible to never had to repeat that experience. The lack of sleep, the physical pain, the constant never-ending worry about money--it sucked. It took just about everything I had to keep going from day to day. Thinking about the future took time and energy I didn't have. There were many times when I realized I was too tired to be driving, not because I was falling asleep at the wheel, but because I did dumb things, like run a red light or cut too close to another car, that I would never have done if I were well-rested and alert. And if I was making stupid choices while driving, what else was I making stupid choices about?
What I think people need to break out of this cycle is:
1. Decent health insurance. ACA is nice, but there are plans that cost over $300/month and have $6,500 deductibles. You might as well not have health insurance.
2. A living minimum wage. A wage that a single person, working 40 hours a week, can afford an apartment, bus pass or car, food, and other basic necessities of life.
3. Decent, reasonably-priced child care. I met several single mothers who struggled to work at retail jobs or temp work, who spent hours every week dealing with child care issues.
4. Programs that ease people off assistance gradually, with the recipient slowly bearing a greater percentage of the cost, instead of dumping them off with nothing, once they hit an arbitrary income amount. If you made $20,000 last year and got free health care, and this year you are making $25,000 and therefore have to pay $1980/year for health insurance with a $5,000 deductible, well, you won't be using that insurance. Part of that "extra" $5,000 goes in taxes, and almost $2,000 goes in insurance fees. Where are you supposed to get the money to pay that first $5,000 in health care fees? Especially if that "extra" $5,000 in your paycheck also means that you lose your food stamps and heating assistance money.
"The grave worries facing the world today mostly don't have solutions. That is, they don't have solutions outside ourselves. We can't vote our troubles away. Or mail them to Washington, either. We can't give fifty dollars to the Sierra Club, read Douglas Coupland, and sing the Captain Planet theme song and set everything right. Instead we have to accept the undramatic and often extremely boring duties of working hard, exercising self-control, taking care of ourselves, our families, and our neighbors, being kind, and practicing as much private morality as we can stand without popping."
- P.J. O'Rourke
I think that we need to work toward the kind of culture that values individual action and responsibility rather than insist on top-down solutions that will never come. A corrupt, spiteful and envious culture cannot legislate it's way into generosity.
Ultralight
5-20-16, 2:52pm
I think both personal and political methods can work. Or rather, the solutions we need to find inside ourselves can be expressed politically outside ourselves and genuinely improve things.
Think of Norway or Denmark or even Canada.
Teacher Terry
5-20-16, 2:55pm
Miss c: you really nailed it when you described your life. I was a young single parent at 21 of a 2yo and worked f.t. with free daycare and we were barely making it. I needed my old car for work and thankfully my parents helped me when it broke down and paid for repairs because I could not. Later I was a SW and saw the misery again. People are so quick to judge and blame poor people for being poor-ugh! You are right about them needing to keep their benefits because making a tiny bit more $ and lose benefits won't help. The ACA with the high deductibles is not useful for many people.
I think both personal and political methods can work. Or rather, the solutions we need to find inside ourselves can be expressed politically outside ourselves and genuinely improve things.
Think of Norway or Denmark or even Canada.
I forget who said "A little government and a little luck are necessary in life, but only a fool trusts either of them".
The one litmus test I would apply is that under no circumstances would I willingly grant power to anyone ridiculous enough to think of laughter as terrorism.
Excellent, heartfelt post, Miss Cellane. I couldn't possibly have said it better.
I've said before that if corporations could get away with outright slavery, they'd be delighted. Then someone challenged me, saying that employers wouldn't want to be responsible for housing, feeding, and otherwise taking care of the slaves. And they were right. They have the very best of both worlds, more so every day. They Even have "dead peasant" insurance.
flowerseverywhere
5-21-16, 6:01am
"The grave worries facing the world today mostly don't have solutions. That is, they don't have solutions outside ourselves. We can't vote our troubles away. Or mail them to Washington, either. We can't give fifty dollars to the Sierra Club, read Douglas Coupland, and sing the Captain Planet theme song and set everything right. Instead we have to accept the undramatic and often extremely boring duties of working hard, exercising self-control, taking care of ourselves, our families, and our neighbors, being kind, and practicing as much private morality as we can stand without popping."
- P.J. O'Rourke
I think that we need to work toward the kind of culture that values individual action and responsibility rather than insist on top-down solutions that will never come. A corrupt, spiteful and envious culture cannot legislate it's way into generosity.
Sometimes you post things and I don't quite get what you are trying to get across. But this was loud and clear.
On poverty, I remember someone once posted on this forum that you can't expect people to pull themselves up by their bootstraps if they don't have boots. Maybe we need to start at the boot level.
flowerseverywhere
5-21-16, 6:09am
And a lot of mental illness that goes untreated. If I want to obtain mental health treatment through my insurance company it is reviewed. I do not want my private issues floating around like that.or possibly being humiliated with a denial. Lucky for me I found a Buddhist support group which helps me deal with my issues. A single poor mom does not have that luxury and may have no access to mental health care
freshstart
5-21-16, 7:55am
Since a high percent qualify for free lunches and reduced fees, the district is allowed the free breakfast. That leaves dinner? If the families qualify for school free breakfast and lunches then the families would get help for food?? I won;t even go on my rant about the over weight families I see using the cards. I would starve and be a toothpick if it meant putting the little food on my child's plate.
Ok sorry for my rant and this will not be well received I imagine.
SNAP has pretty strict rules to keep it. People do not qualify to receive it for years and years if there is an able bodied adult able to work
freshstart
5-21-16, 8:02am
Not that long ago, I spent two years unemployed. I supported myself with a part-time retail job and temp work, lots and lots of temp work. These are some of the things I learned.
1. A full-time retail job, even at a bit over minimum wage, is not enough to support one adult in my area. (That's with sharing an apartment with a roommate, driving a 10 year old car, necessary in an area with limited public transportation, and no "frills," like cable TV.) I made a lot more money temping, but it wasn't always steady work. Thus, the retail job for a bit of steady income, and the temping to make any actual money. I was offered a full-time job at the store, but when I did the math, it made a lot more sense to continue to work the two jobs--retail schedules are so erratic that fitting in a part-time job to supplement that income would have been very difficult.
2. Cooking healthy meals from scratch is good. Cooking a healthy dinner from scratch when you have been working 13 hour days, five days in a row, and are getting home on the 6th day at 7 pm after 8.5 hours on your feet being nice to customers who are not always nice back? Well, your feet hurt, so you don't want to stand for very long. You are exhausted, and hungry, and you need to get to bed in three hours so you can get up and do it all over again the next day. You haven't had a day completely off from both jobs in 4 weeks and your brain is fried. Eating fast food takes 5 minutes through the drive-through, and you are fed. It is not a good choice. It is not a choice I made often. But I completely understand why someone would make that choice and I can't blame them.
Yes, I tried to make big batches of food and freeze it. Did this a lot, actually. But a month of non-stop work and the frozen food would be gone, and I had to make choices as to how best to use my free time--laundry? food shopping? cooking? napping? contacting all the people in my life I simply had not time for? getting out for a walk in the fresh air? a little housework, like cleaning the bathroom or changing the sheets? There were months on end when my "free time" was an afternoon, twice a month. There's only so much you can pack into that time, especially when you are seemingly permanently tired.
And if you don't have your own washer and dryer, laundry becomes a very time-consuming chore. If you don't have a good stove, cooking is harder. Lots of low-income people rent, and have no say in the appliances they use in their homes. You might have a small refrigerator with a tiny freezer, limiting the amount of food you can make ahead. Your oven might not work.
3. Retail schedules. I'm guessing this goes for fast food word schedules, as well. There is absolutely no consistency, day to day or week to week, as to when you work. You are always working over a meal time. 10 am to 2:30 pm? That includes lunch time for most people I know. But it's a short enough shift that, in my state at least, there is no break. So when do you eat? Hold off on breakfast until 9 am and eat just before you leave for work? Eat at your normal 6:30 am and have a snack at 9? And when you eat lunch at 3 or 3:30, it throws off your dinner schedule, because you aren't going to be hungry at your usual 6:30 dinner time.
I have no proof, but I do wonder if these sorts of schedules have an effect on people's weight. There's never an opportunity to get into a set schedule for meals. You are always grabbing a snack to tide you over. You may have to eat when you are not hungry, because you are scheduled for a meal break at a specific time and your manager insists you go to eat then. Or you spend several hours being hungry, because you don't get a break during your shift.
4. Sometimes you have to make choices about buying food or fixing the 10 year old car that is the lifeline that gets you to work. Without the car, you can't work, in areas with little or no public transportation.
You learn to make the choice that solves the most pressing problem now. Even if it means paying out the rent money for new tires. You need to have that car--you will worry about the rent in two weeks when it is due.
You aren't always thinking clearly. You are just trying to solve the current crisis so you can move on to the next one.
5. You don't always make good choices when you are tired. Working for weeks on end without a day off is not good for you. And you may make what seems like a good decision at the time. Months later, you wonder how that idea even came into your head. Someone who is working two or more jobs just to make ends meet is probably tired and burned out. And not making the best choices, because burn out does funny things to your mind.
But taking a day off to rest up is risky. If you don't go in to the temp job on Saturday, when they are offering overtime to get the project done, will that be a black mark against you the next time that company is looking for temps? You like working there, the pay is good, you need the money. Instead of taking that Saturday off, that Saturday you have been looking forward to for weeks, because it is the first weekend day that you haven't been scheduled for the retail job in months, you smile and go to the temp job. When the retail job calls at 5 pm, just as you are leaving the temp job, and tells you there was a call-out for the 6-9:30 shift and can you come in? You remember that people who don't accommodate requests like this get the crummy shifts, and you smile and you forget about your evening plans of cooking dinner and doing laundry and getting to bed early, and you go to work. You eat a peanut butter sandwich in the car on the way there. When you get home at 10 pm, you hand wash some underwear (because the apartment building laundry room closes at 10 pm), pack tomorrow's lunch and dinner (because it's a two job day), and fall into bed, having done pretty much nothing all day but work.
6. I met a lot of people who got food stamps and WIC, free lunches for their kids, medical care for their kids and themselves. Some of whom were afraid to look for permanent, full-time jobs, because they knew they could not make enough money at a job to replace the level of health care that their kids got--and needed. Free lunch in our town allows families to get $10 a month internet service, to help with the kids' homework. Food stamps make you eligible for a free smart phone with a very low cost monthly fee (otherwise, many people would have no phone at all). They don't like the temping/retail work lifestyle, but they can't see a realistic way out of it that doesn't leave their family worse off than before.
My feeling is that if you have a full-time job, or two part-time jobs, you really ought be able to support yourself. But the wages in the US don't allow for this, and that's not even considering the expenses of living in areas like NYC or San Francisco. And I don't think people should have to work themselves into exhaustion just to pay rent and put food on the table. I met many people who could have worked at much "better" jobs, but they were too run down from the work load to have the time or energy to job hunt. Or they had been so beaten down by life that they were convinced that what they were doing was the best they could possibly do.
A lot of these jobs take a physical toll on the body. Bad backs, bad knees--these were rampant. The human body was not meant to spend 8-10 hours a day standing and walking on concrete floors. People went home in pain. People took double and triple the recommended doses of over-the-counter pain killers just to get through a shift. Even the full-timers, who had health insurance, couldn't afford the doctor's visits to get these problems treated. (It was apparently crummy health insurance.)
I made it through and now have a permanent, full-time job. And I am doing everything possible to never had to repeat that experience. The lack of sleep, the physical pain, the constant never-ending worry about money--it sucked. It took just about everything I had to keep going from day to day. Thinking about the future took time and energy I didn't have. There were many times when I realized I was too tired to be driving, not because I was falling asleep at the wheel, but because I did dumb things, like run a red light or cut too close to another car, that I would never have done if I were well-rested and alert. And if I was making stupid choices while driving, what else was I making stupid choices about?
What I think people need to break out of this cycle is:
1. Decent health insurance. ACA is nice, but there are plans that cost over $300/month and have $6,500 deductibles. You might as well not have health insurance.
2. A living minimum wage. A wage that a single person, working 40 hours a week, can afford an apartment, bus pass or car, food, and other basic necessities of life.
3. Decent, reasonably-priced child care. I met several single mothers who struggled to work at retail jobs or temp work, who spent hours every week dealing with child care issues.
4. Programs that ease people off assistance gradually, with the recipient slowly bearing a greater percentage of the cost, instead of dumping them off with nothing, once they hit an arbitrary income amount. If you made $20,000 last year and got free health care, and this year you are making $25,000 and therefore have to pay $1980/year for health insurance with a $5,000 deductible, well, you won't be using that insurance. Part of that "extra" $5,000 goes in taxes, and almost $2,000 goes in insurance fees. Where are you supposed to get the money to pay that first $5,000 in health care fees? Especially if that "extra" $5,000 in your paycheck also means that you lose your food stamps and heating assistance money.
hand clap, ITA
Thank you for your heartfelt post, Miss Cellane.
I think that we need to work toward the kind of culture that values individual action and responsibility rather than insist on top-down solutions that will never come. A corrupt, spiteful and envious culture cannot legislate it's way into generosity.
Translation: everyone who is poor is just lazy and envious of rich people. don't even bother considering the "culture" of business greed, legislative refusal to consider universal healthcare, minimal investment in public transit, "minimum" wage laws which can't support a single adult, etc. etc. It's all Your Fault.
ApatheticNoMore
5-21-16, 11:22am
An actual answer what can I do? I don't know, I always think picking up liter (by the freeway or whereever it is found) would be a good thing to do - uh with gloves. The truth is I don't think I can do much, I'm pretty tired and burned out myself and I don't think this society is going to change that easily (those who make political ;) revolution impossible and so on... ).
While this isn't true of everything, there seems even less protest than there used to be. Some had said everyone just tweets at each other these days instead and assumes somehow it does some good (where you are actually hear the "social justice warrior" term - where someone is engaged in some massive twitter battle signifying nothing).
And a lot of mental illness that goes untreated. If I want to obtain mental health treatment through my insurance company it is reviewed. I do not want my private issues floating around like that.or possibly being humiliated with a denial.
legally you should be protected by HIPAA, it's not legal to share that stuff all over, but in actuality a major insurer like blue cross was hacked so ... considering how everyone else is driven nuts with HIPAA compliance 24/7, that should have been a much bigger scandal. I don't think they deny mental health care easily though.
Lucky for me I found a Buddhist support group which helps me deal with my issues.
the Buddhist support group is probably far better anyway, and maybe most support groups are (ok provided they aren't cults - cults are bad mkay). Although it's someone to complain to, I've found most therapy a combination of worthless, helpful and damaging and I'm not whatsoever convinced the helpful outweighs the damaging because I do think it does some actual damage. And they charge you money for it. Maybe I had bad luck, but I've tried many and a lot of the same unhelpfulness tends to come up regardless.
iris lilies
5-21-16, 12:27pm
The working poor are heroes. But what does being a hero get you?
My ghetto neighbors may be right in their attitude of distain for punching a time clock and working dor
The Man. Much better to sit out on the sidewalk with 40 oz livng your life on the street.
gimmethesimplelife
5-21-16, 2:50pm
Thank you for your heartfelt post, Miss Cellane.Plus about a million.....Rob
I think that we need to work toward the kind of culture that values individual action and responsibility rather than insist on top-down solutions that will never come. A corrupt, spiteful and envious culture cannot legislate it's way into generosity.
Personally I think that we need to work towards the kind of culture that doesn't exalt greed as a particularly good thing and that calls out selfish uncharitability for the selfishness and uncaring of other human beings that it actually is. To consider the top 1% of the population having 40% of the wealth as anything other than obscene is absurd in my eyes.
I just read an article by an uber rich guy saying that there has never been this level of income inequality without the pitchforks coming out, seems like we are ready for pitchforks
Williamsmith
5-21-16, 4:36pm
I don't hold anything against the über rich. All they are doing is taking advantage of the monetary system. Trouble is they don't have anywhere to stuff their money that brings a return so they are buying stuff. Building visible assets, protecting all these assets with more visible assets. So guess who sees all this visible wealth? The people who don't have it and the same ones who were satisfied with a simple standard of living that allowed after a simple satisfying career a simple satisfying retirement. But no the global trade deals, the de industrialization, the radical environmentalism, the attack of political correctness has just poked sticks in their eye. And now, they see that the debt resulting from run away governmental spending and warmongering all over the globe and the interventionist tactics of easy money war debt subsidized militarism left them high and dry. No retirement, no infrastructure, no career jobs, crumbling schools, citizens who feel they have to be armed to go to the shopping mall or movie theatre. Yeah, the pitchforks are being sharpened. It only remains to be seen if we will participate in a revolution back to sound money policy or step into the socialist/fascist/ /communist abyss.
I just read an article by an uber rich guy saying that there has never been this level of income inequality without the pitchforks coming out, seems like we are ready for pitchforksWhenever people see themselves as sans-culottes, a Robespierre will always come along to lead them to a glorious victory. The question is, do you have what it takes to survive the obligatory reign of terror?
The guys with culottes haven't figured out yet that they can't buy immortality. And if history is any indicator, their heirs will squander the ill-gotten gains. So it's all for naught, Moneybags. Meanwhile their greed has crippled the country. Impressive legacy.
ToomuchStuff
5-21-16, 8:26pm
What can you do? I don't believe that there is a one solution solves all thing. There are variables that differ. I do believe the first thing one can and should do, is get their own house in order as the saying goes. If one has their own house in order, they know at least somethings that work and have developed skill sets to solve problems. Then hopefully they have also developed the ability to work with others. You will not, nor will I, have all the answers, and education plays an important part and I am not talking about overpriced education that advertising leads people to believe it is the answer.
I do not believe either stupidity, or ignorance and quickly reacting solves issues. People react to issues with value judgements, yet money has no values. There are those that simple know how money works and use it's principles to keep it flowing and siphon parts of it off for their own benefit. I don't understand the working poor are hero's comment, but maybe I am missing something. Our values are not theirs, our goals, not theirs. I actually consistently feel this argument in my own head, when it comes to software. Closed source verses Free and open source software. Companies like Microsoft feel that controlling their software and their associations, create jobs which then bring money back to them. Then you have both free software and open software (not the same things). Those have proven to provide jobs and income, yet allow those without the financial resources to use them as tools that they are. Personal values will have to change, with more people feeling the urge to cooperate, before changes happen.
The guys with culottes haven't figured out yet that they can't buy immortality. And if history is any indicator, their heirs will squander the ill-gotten gains. So it's all for naught, Moneybags. Meanwhile their greed has crippled the country. Impressive legacy.When the sans-culottes squander those same, now twice ill-gotten gains after the revolution, will it still be for naught?
When the sans-culottes squander those same, now twice ill-gotten gains after the revolution, will it still be for naught?
Squandering at least gets the economy moving, if there's enough of it. Spent on infrastructure, green engineering, and other worthy products, it wouldn't be for naught.
Squandering at least gets the economy moving, if there's enough of it. Spent on infrastructure, green engineering, and other worthy products, it wouldn't be for naught.So it really just depends upon who's doing the squandering?
So it really just depends upon who's doing the squandering?
Not really; it's more like spending money here vs. hoarding it. That's just one consideration, of course.
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