Giggle. Well, he really likes steak. And just about anything else. He’s been living with his dad for the last three years. Up to that point we shared custody. When he comes up to visit me (they live on “the Kenai” about 150 miles South of Anchorage), he eats as much in a few days as I do all month long!
Heh heh. Well, I would think that his having been breastfed had something to do with it, but his 25 year old half sister wasn’t breast fed, and she was several inches taller than I am when she was about that same age.
Well, working poor might be a loaded term, but if you’re gainfully employed (working) and still struggling to make ends meet on a very modest lifestyle (poor, or at least relatively), then it would seem to be an accurate term. Even if the term isn’t accurate in this case, that still doesn’t show how the OP is blaming society for their current situation.
Nyctea, you still don’t get it, do you? Nobody gives a flying fuck when or whether you have children or not. What people do care about is you declaring yourself the sole arbiter of what constitutes a good life, and you announcing that anyone who has different priorities than you deserves to get shat upon by life. You are not one iota different from that asshat who told the OP that her post-partum depression was a punishment for getting pregnant before she was married.
I think, and this is just an impression, not proof of any sort, that the term is generally used while discussing societal problems. We’ll talk about people who are poor in a general sense, but when you want to address this particular problem, the term working poor gets pulled out. Suggesting that they aren’t just poor people, but that they are poor people who are poor because of a specific issue.
Using the term associates whatever statement you’re making with the issue.
“Working poor” means to me those folks who for whatever reason, have either minimal skills or have jobs that pay minimum wage (which is not a living wage) and have no bennys. These folks tend to ahve 2-3 part time jobs, either due to school, child care issues, perhaps a criminal record of some kind.
There are plenty of people who don’t have the above obstacles and still are in the working poor category-sounds to me like Ink may be a part of that, at least temporarily.
I know an RN who qualifies as working poor–she makes good money, but is caring for her disabled husband, her kids, her brother who has problems etc. She has so many open, hungry mouths to feed–last count, she had at least 6, if not 7 “dependents”. She is a classic example of someone who, if single, or with 1 dependent, would be fine–but she is a sandwich generation and she struggles to pay her utilities.
Oh-and this is for nyctea --when they had kids, her husband wasn’t disabled–he got injured at work. Her brother is an alcholic, though–you can have fun with that one.
to clarify–this nurse friend has 3 kids; I forgot to mention that she takes care of her Dad, too. 1 husband, 3 kids, 1 Dad and 1 brother and her. She is going back to school for her Master’s of Nursing. They may shop at Kmart, but that doesn’t bother them…
Working poor is used because otherwise a certain part of the population translates poor to “those layabouts on foodstamps who don’t bother to hold jobs and live off MY taxes.” Working poor may qualify for some public assistance - or they may not.
But then the moment you use working poor - well, then its these people’s fault because they’ve made “bad choices.” Which is sometimes true. There are plenty of people who work who didn’t make good choices. And sometimes it isn’t true. There are plenty of people who are working poor because they’ve had bad luck. And I’ll grant that luck is sometimes the result of choices we make.
I have a good, well paying job. How did I get the job? I’d like to believe it was all about me - I was talented, took efforts to network, etc. But honestly - I knew the guy who was in the job before me, thought the bottom might drop out of consulting (it did) - right place, right time, right intution. As much luck as anything. I have a friend who is as talented, or more talented than I am. Just as hard a worker. Didn’t get offered a job out of the blue, got laid off, spent time unemployed and three years scrambling before falling into a good job. And his wife had a good job, which she got laid off from as well, followed by some health issues that kept her basically unemployable. Now they aren’t working poor, but they did have a spate of bad luck that’s kept them from being where they thought they’d be.
In our case, we are not able to qualify for WIC, by a whopping $10 per month. We could qualify for section 8 housing assistance, except there is about a 3 year waiting list, because of the cost of housing here. The local housing office isn’t even accepting applications any longer. If we lived somewhere else, we would live more comfortably, but I’m sure that my wage would be reduced as well. The biggest problem really is that the cost of living goes up much faster than what employers pay. And then they reduce benefits to save more money, which they can add to profits for shareholders. I’m fortunate to work for a company that does provide benefits, but only to members of management. No one else works “full time”. Mostly because the managers job is to make sure no one works full time. If it’s quiet, we have to send people home to save labor dollars. No one ever makes more than 30 hours in a week. Except maybe my dishwasher. Gotta have a dish washer.
I found this part interesting, and it hasn’t been commented on as far as I read:
Interesting, as I said, that being able to work for cash is important enough to mention.
Not that anyone in that position would even think of avoiding taxes, I’m sure. And certainly not anyone who complained that our society doesn’t do enough for its unfortunates.
Having not read the whole thread I am struck with:
Move out of Hayward!!!, I’ll bet you that being “working poor” in the bay area costs more than being “middle class” (read: better neighborhood) elsewhere.
I keep accurate and totally above board books, any time you’d like to see them. But cash is significantly better than say, a check or credit card, which may take several days to clear and could bounce/be rejected. Cash=good.
I confess. Secretly I’m not even a woman. I am a hairy Russian man who’s principal job is creating and sending “direct email marketing” for viagra and penis enlarging pills. I also have a fantastic money laundring scam worked out whereby I use stolen social security numbers of dead homless people to rake in disability, social secuirty, and welfare checks from the US government. On my days off, I beat kittens. <b>MaxTheVool</b> and <b>DrLoveGun</a> are my cronies, and all part of my elaborate plot to falsify my identity. Using this message board allows me to cultivate my persona, as well as leave a “paper trail” of my phony existence.
See my explanation. I’ve taken credit card payments by PayPal and had it go hideously wrong. Tomorrow’s client will be paying by check, and while I am not a fan of this (checks can bounce), she seems fairly trustworthy and if I get screwed then I will just simply never make the exception again.
I don’t know why inkleberry emphasized “cash” in that post, but when I read it my mind didn’t automatically go to “oooh, she’s avoiding taxes!” In my mind (which I admit isn’t always correct), “working for cash” would mean you get paid on the spot for each session or gig or service you provide. Rather than doing what most of us do, which is to work like a dog and then wait two weeks for a check. I think all of us would choose to get paid on a daily or hourly basis if we had a choice. I’m betting someone would like this option especially if they’re broke, and waiting for payment would mean starvation.
