Are poor people poor because they're lazy?

Great Debates
21

I think we can probably agree that there is no one reason for poverty in this country. There is a different story to be heard for almost anyone in a bad way. The ‘lazy’ group exists (know many of them personally), but so do quite a few others as we’ve heard here.

The reasons for poverty in the US are quite different than those world-wide. I think many people who are at poverty level in other countries would do much better here (ie - the motivation would be there). I’m refering to those who currently have no choices where they live, but here would be able to go after many jobs (even what have been referred to in this thread as undesirable) and make a good life for themselves. What bugs me is that many citizens of the US believe they are above that. Too bad. I remember cleaning toilets as well as floors, and anythign else (legal) to make a dollar. No regrets. Things are very good now, but if I ever had to pull myself out from under again I’d look for any kind of work before a hand out.

22

Laziness may not cause poverty, but perhaps poverty causes laziness. Consider the fact that there is a significant number of working poor. For every person like lee, there are several who try, but don’t have the discipline, skills, inteligence, or luck

to make it. If you grew up in a family or neighborhood in which a lot of people didn’t have a job or want one, and those who did were generally no better off but worked a whole lot harder, you might decide work was for suckers, too.

23

I don’t know why you didn’t get calls (I suspect you would have more response if you put the part about $20/hr on your signs, though).

What I do know is that laziness is not a necessary prerequisite for being poor or worse than poor. In 1997 I was completing my fourth year as a professional social worker, making what seemed to me to be a spectacular amount of money ($26,500 annually before taxes) considering that I could have done what I was doing then at any time during the previous years when I had not been able to land such a position. But here I was, and I figured, now that I’ve had such a position to list on my resume, I’ll never again have to worry about being unemployable.

Then the agency went belly-up, got defunded. Between September and February, I was on unemployment compensation and send out hundreds (eventually nearly a thousand) of applications in response to ads for social workers. In February, I took a miserable low-wage job doing invasive telephone research for commercial corporations (one step about telemarketing at best), which required me to bike 22 miles per day on a borrowed bicycle. By the skin of my teeth I managed to make it to a few job interviews while holding that job.

Any minor fluctuation in my circumstances at that time could have put me out homeless on the street and unable to retain the miserable shit-job, let alone continue to seek better jobs for which I was qualified. As it turned out, the landowner evicted every tenant in the building on 1 month’s notice 2 years later, and if this had occurred THEN instead, that would have done me in for a pretty long haul. Heck, if I’d hit a sandy patch of gravel and sprained my ankle, THAT would have done it.

Now I seem well-ensconced in a job paying more than twice what I was making as a social worker, mainly because I picked up the art of programming in FileMaker Pro in order to manage social work clients while working as a social worker.

Luck is not the whole story by any means. I acknowledge that I am bright, learn skills quickly, and, once given a domain in which decision-making is necessary and admired, run my space effectively with a minimum of tedious hand holding and micro-management, and I’m a responsible person :slight_smile:

But that description fit me when I had no official degree or experience to put on a resume; and it fit me when I had both but couldn’t get a job nibble in my chosen field. So it also isn’t motivation and skill either.

24

I can’t believe people actually believe that poor people are lazy. Amazing. That’s not to say there aren’t poor people who simply won’t work, but I assure you sometimes it isn’t because you don’t want to work.

25

In my experience as a pawnbroker, poor people remain poor because they have no coping skills. They seem to be unable to think creatively about solving problems and, to a certain extent, seem to suffer from “learned helplessness”, or just locking up like a deer in the headlights when faced with a problem.
In several cases, I’ve tried to tell poor customers of mine how to get ahead on their bills, even gave them free copies of my personal finance books. All to no avail.

26

Just wondering since $US20/hr seems like an awful lot for a housekeeper. No, I guess not–you mention AFDC is an American program, or so I thought.

What do programmer analysts make in your neck of the woods? I’ll move there!

27

ROTFLMFAO

To answer the OP, yes ::Ducks::

OK, Usually. I deliver to fast food restaurants and most of the employees (not just the kids) make me think ‘This person is way overpaid, even at minimum wage’. Occasionally I see someone that works way to hard for the paltry pay they must receive. I believe this second group will eventually work their way out of poverty.

There are many high paying blue collar jobs that require nothing more than hard work and reliability. I am sure the poor have obstacles to overcome such as transportation, inertia, etc. But most of the companies that have these high paying jobs simply cannot find people willing to work hard.

28

JimShep – what was funny, in the quote?

29

Do you think anybody is that honest? If they were they sure woud not accept money for doing nothing.

30

Can you provide cites or websites for this, or is this your personal opinion?

Here in St. Cloud, Minnesota, the pay is depressed compared to other areas in the state. I was laid off in March from a factory job where I had worked almost 25 years. Many of the jobs I looked at in other factories started at $7 an hour or less. That is not enough to make house and utility payments. My unemployment checks paid me more, and I enrolled in the areas’ Displaced Worker Program and took some computer and office skills classes. Many of those jobs start at about $8 an hour. I am fortunate enough now to be temping at a place that pays $10.68 per hour, which is almost unheard of in this town for a temp. This job will last until the 19th of this month, and then I will be looking again.

One of the problems that many employers have around here is finding workers, and getting them to stay. If they were to offer better pay and benefits, they would probably not have this problem.

31

Yep, I’ve known some. Really. More than you’d think.

Used to be, if you failed to report income, or money received as a gift, or sporadic child support payments (back in the days before the states took it over), you could lose your eligibility. That’s a scary prospect.

Some people were honest to a fault (if that’s possible), and some probably might have liked to “cheat” a little, but thought they’d be found out for sure. Remember back when folks thought the government was competent? I knew people who believed caseworkers knew (or could find out) anything about them, and they lived in fear of having a boyfriend spend a night.

I remember one woman who refused to accept money or gifts for her child (from the child’s father), because she just didn’t want to deal with the caseworkers and the paperwork.

This was 30 years ago though, and I suspect times have changed.

32

Just had second thoughts about my last post. I did not mean to imply that anyone forced onto welfare (temporarily) by circumstances is dishonest, but anyone who stays on welfare when they are capable of working is not honest.

Spider Woman – Actually it is personal experience, my last two jobs were like this, (relatively) High pay, hard work, no skills. A helper at my company can make $30,000 a year, easy. You take boxes off the truck, stack them, and wheel them into the store. Not brain surgery by any means, but very physical. I assumed (maybe wrongly) that these jobs were around everywhere. And these companies hire plenty of people, they just quit when they see how hard the work is.

Not trying to start a debate, but most women would be physicaly incapable of doing these jobs.

I live in Massachussetts, and both these jobs were away from the higher paying (and cost of living) Boston area.

33

You are probably right about some women not being able to handle that sort of job, although I have worked with several who could have and did work at physically challenging jobs. Most of those sorts of jobs around here start at about $9 an hour. Thirty an hour for a non-union shop, which many places in St. Cloud are, is unheard of, and even the unions don’t help much.

I have never been muscular, and could not do that sort of lifting at any great speed.

I believe that it has become more difficult to survive than it was when I first started working many years ago. The cost of living (housing, groceries, utilities, etc.) has far outpaced the wages, especially around here. I think it would be easy for people to become discouraged. Also, many of the welfare recipients around here are young, single mothers whose partners split when they became pregnant. These young women have the cost of daycare to add to the other bills they need to pay.

I admire the changes that the welfare program in our area has made. They have esteem-building types of classes, and skills training which may make it easier for people to try to better themselves. I personally don’t believe that poor people choose to be poor. I think that everyone does the best they can with the personal coping skills available to them, as Usurersaid. By the way, Usurer, it’s nice to know that there are people like you out there trying to help.

34

That was $30,000 a year

It’s all paid by what you do, so the average pay is anywhere from $11-$14 an hour, depending on the route and how fast you work. An average day is 8-12 hours, 4 day work week and an extra day or two is usually available, but no time and a half. A helper who works 5 days (about 50 hours)can easily make that $30,000. Great pay IMHO.

For the $9 an Hr Spidar Woman mentioned.
$9 hr X 40 hrs a week X 52 weeks = about 19,000. Throw in 5-10 hours a week OT at time and a half and you are in the mid 20’s, I don’t consider this poor. For me 50 hours is a normal week, so maybe that’s a step above ‘not lazy’

35

There are 2 catagories of poor. The working poor and the unemployed poor. Are the working poor poor because they’re lazy? Some are, some because they’re addicts, some because they’re uneducated, some because they don’t have the language skills. As for the unemployed, I don’t know. I’ve known many poor immigrant workers in my day. My deadbeat dad always said 'If you try to outwork one of ‘em, you’ll have a heart attack’. For the most part he was right, they were not lazy.

As to why the OP’s ad did not recive calls, I have several thoughts. 1)There are many working poor who already have full-time (40+hrs, but for low wage)jobs. Such a part-time gig may well interfere. No one is gonna put short term cash ahead of a steady paying gig. 2) I have seen many such ads in Los Angeles. You see them on bulliten boards in laundromats and grocery stores and what-not. Most of them seem, well, a bit hinkey. The kind of screw job that promises some cash, but does not deliver. That happens often in these parts.