"We can all come up with examples that the poor are poor because they choose to." If you want to be what you have never been then you have to do what you have never done.
AND I thought that all Americans were Millionaires and had their own Private Planes... Myth and Reality...
Perhaps its easier being on the outside looking in. Here is my solution fellas and I'm not charging a dime ! 1. Have a minimum wage that one can live on. 2. Have a fairer tax system. Bill Gates and company can probably scrape along on only a billion or two each. 3. Get rid of the moronic President that is pouring America's wealth into the sands of Arabia and not getting anything to show for it. 4. Try not to elect another idiot for at least 10 years. Not so hard really !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
"1. Have a minimum wage that one can live on." If you have a minimun wage of $7 an hour and you're getting $3 an hour worth of work out of that employee, paying him $12 an hour and still getting $3 worth of work out of that employee contributes to inflation. Govts (state local and federal) plus the trial lawyers and their mother the insurance cos already ruin productivity enough as it is. A minimun wage job is already over waged based on govt et al policies requirements for employees, hence the immigration problem.
I'm as pro free markets as the next guy but as someone who lives in the US most of the year I am frankly very pleased that most the people at the bottom of the pile (legal ones anyway) are making $7 instead of $3. Saves me a bunch on personal security if you know what I mean. Seriously can you imagine what the US would be like if you basically cut the pay check of everyone making $20hr or less by 50-60%?
1. minimum wage? its supposed to be the MINIMUM. that means you live on the minimum level. you should not be living in a cardboard shack with a brand new escalade parked out front. If you are making minimum wage you should not have a cell phone, cable tv, or $200 sneakers. Make some choices appropriate to your situation. 2. Fairer tax system. YES! I pay more than twice the tax rate of Warren Buffet. Thats bullshit. 3. and 4. moron president. i voted for him, but I didn't think he was going to spend like a drunken sailor. He does need to go. Too bad there is not a great replacement for him. Its just the lesser of two (or twenty) evils. The only problem with a fair tax system is that the morons in the white house and congress will spend all that money before it comes in. We need accountability in government. Which will never happen. You cannot spend your way out of a fundamentally flawed situation.
That's the whole point: I don't have to live in their shoes because I choose not to make stupid decisions. I had the skills needed to work at a grocery store in elementary school. And even if I sat around like a bum doing nothing to improve my life for decades, if I was still working at a grocery store I wouldn't have 3 kids. That's just stupid. People like this are poor because they live beyond their means and make no effort to improve their situation. It's no coincidence that they're poor. Only in America can you walk down the street and see people paying thousands of dollars for metal rims for their cars, paying top dollar for bottled water, rolex watches that cost 10k that are no more accurate than a timex, and Nike shoes that sell for $160 but cost $2 to make. If you can figure out a way to make money in a situation like that then it's not my problem. It's the people in Africa and India that really have it hard. If someone had medical issues and fell down on their luck and had a hard time making ends meet that's a different story. I saw this guy in San Francisco a few weeks ago, he hides in bushes and scares crowds all day and people give him money. He makes $60,000 a year. Point is, people give their money away easily if you're not too lazy to find a way to get it. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Famous_Bushman
"Everyone on this board is "relatively" educated, perhaps take a little of that energy and direct it to helping those who need it. You don't have to give money, but perhaps one less evening at the bull and bear and volunteer one evening at the food bank or local family shelter might put things in perspective for you." _______________________________________________ I don't need to volunteer to gain perspective. I've hired them, have had them for customers. what do you want me to do? "Talk to them?" Sorry, we don't speak the same language, I might as well be an alien from outter space with my ideas. You want me to set an example? Okay, I'll work 12 hours a day 7 days a week and they call me a chump. They say I'm lucky to have a nice car. Yea, lucky I come to work everyday and applied myself. You sound like you have found your way and I have total sympathy for single moms with kids, it is tough. Single moms need a course in valuing their own assets before they bargain them away to a sperm donor. Yeah, maybe they don't want your money but that doesn't stop them from thinking the world owes them "something". Maybe a little "power" would be nice. Steal a little "time" when the boss ain't looking, fvck with your customers, small time scamming. They leave their girlfriends pregnant or a girlfriend with kids, do you know why? Because they know they have nothing to offer, all they have is time-time they can offer to be a father, and they can't even do that. America loves the underdog, seldom does talent go unnoticed. Some just don't want it, can't deal with or have been conditioned by a generational past upbringing where nothing mattered so why should it matter to me. Even if we did not interact as you suggest, we still pay taxes.
can't find it at the moment, but there is a record number of companies, something north of an unbelievable 40%, that are unable to find qualified employees - everything from construction mgt, to pool management, to mechanics. i'm sorry, but it's very hard to be sympathetic for the people who can't find that $25 toll paying job (tip: can still be found in PA), or the $40 sewing job, or the $75 an hour manufacturing job that requires nothing but a HS education. if people want or need higher salaries, they need to look at themselves and develop the skills that 40%+ of companies evidently can't find. i personally feel much worse for the people in third world countries living on 200/month for 60 hours a week, in a hut, and don't have access to freedom, information, resources, education, and opportunities this country has for free, or maybe a low interest, taxpayer subsidized home loan or student loan. the attitude beginning to pervade this country is that because they were born, they have the right to have someone else (it's a real person paying, the govt just doesn't get some magical budget from the sky) pay for their free healthcare, free college, free education, paid vacations, free house, paid retirement after 60 for life, etc. of course, this is all paid for by the sweat of someone else's labor. i'm not sure who's worse, the people expecting others to pay for these things for them, or the people who think they have a right to take it from the people who earned it, to give it to those unwilling to earn it.