The cost of beef has been going up steadily for a while, even now when I’m buying hundreds of pounds wholesale $1.99/lb is hard to find. The most recent price I was quoted was $2.99/lb or $2.49/lb if I wanted 10% TVP. And when found, my experience is to avoid it. So now I look for the low cost cuts of high quality beef (like chuck) and grind my own.
“cheap beef” isn’t worth the cost, like a shitty pair of boots that won’t keep your fee dry. If you can find good quality meat for a reasonable price have at it, stock up, and enjoy.
Even Broomstick agrees the shit in a tube isn’t worth a dollar, but for too many Americans (rich and poor) it looks like a great buy.
So what you’re saying is that I didn’t say “live on rice and beans and nothing else.” You linked to three threads where I also did not say that. Feel free to apologize.
Again, what I said was not to waste money on ramen noodles. But you managed to twist what I said, then rationalize the purchase of ramen noodles.
I also recognize that there are a small number of people who are incapable of learning it, but I don’t believe we should penalize everyone else because of that.
A lot of it had to do with the WAY you said it.
No one called you out for the gardening suggestion. We did point out that not everyone is able to garden, or has access to the space to do it. That’s why it won’t work for everyone.
Why do you keep saying that? Who is being penalized?
But at least you’ve finally acknowledged that SOME people suck at budgeting, no not everyone, some.
Or the way you misrepresent it when quoting me to others? Still no apology I see.
Again, where did I say “all.” My first few links showed the number of people in poverty that smoked, clearly showing that NOT all people in poverty smoke. But for those that do, wouldn’t not smoking be a better idea than smoking?
Gardening is a great idea for people that can, and a horrible idea for people that can’t. I’d love to see gonzomax misrepresent your post about hydroponics.
What’s odd, is that you’re capable of understanding the cost of running grow lights, but balk at my suggestion that people turn off the lights they aren’t using as a way to save money. That because, “poor people should sit in the dark.”
In that case, I wouldn’t have a problem with it, but I suspect the VAST majority of poor women aren’t suffering from birth control failures when they have children.
And last time I checked, it was legal to get an abortion. Whether or not the government funds it is a different story. It doesn’t make you a right-wing nut to think that maybe the government shouldn’t fund abortions, but that they should remain legal.
…I don’t see how you have been misrepresented. But maybe you could help clarify. Do you think that it is possible to do everything that you have suggested (Close doors, sleep on the floor, have no TV, grow your own garden, etc), and still end up poor?
It is an issue of tone.
No poor people shouldn’t smoke or play the lottery or leave the lights on unnecessarily. However, I would venture to say that a large majority do not need this pointed out to us.
By saying things like:
or:
You imply in your tone that poor equals lazy and/or stupid and by simply following your few simple recommendations the poor will magically transport themselves to an easier life.
Poverty, much like wealth, does not confine itself to the deserving.
Being made to feel that we are less human, less intelligent and less able to make our own decisions (good or bad) simply because of a lack of income is demoralizing at best.
I know quite a few poor women who have no children at all. I know more than only have 1 or 2 in a lifetime. Clearly, not all poor women are churnin’ out children as fast as possible, either.
Legal does you no good if you have no access. If you can’t afford to put food on your table - which is basically where you have to be to get foodstamps - where in the hell are you going to get several hundred dollars for an abortion? If there’s only one or two places that do abortions in a state how do you get yourself there?
Then there are the stupid rules in some places that say a woman has to show up, then be sent away for 24 or 48 hours to “think” about having an abortion. Where is the poor woman supposed to stay? At a hotel? Sleep on a park bench?
A middle class woman can get in her car, be confident in being able to put enough gas in that car to get there and back, stay overnight if necessary in comfortable surroundings… all of those things cost money and that’s ON TOP OF the cost of an abortion. A poor woman lacks money, that’s more or less why she’s poor.
The average abortion in the first trimester costs between $350 and $550. For a second trimester the average jumps to $500-650. Even a lot of middle class people would feel that as a pinch, a dent in the monthly budget, but for a poor woman in some cases it might as well be a million.
Government won’t subsidize an abortion - but it WILL subsidize her pregnancy.
Which is the logical choice for a poor woman who can’t afford an abortion because she just doesn’t have the money? Can you honestly call that situation a choice?
Yet if she takes the “choice” that will be paid for she will be condemned for it.
Yeah I’ve debated it. I don’t know, I find it fun to hand wash and I can really give individual attention to each piece to really handle those tough stains, etc.
Her birthday is in November, Christmas is in December (or so I hear?). I’m thinking a washer for one, dryer for the other? Haha.
Kids are around a long time. Lots of people had them when times were better and the Bankers did not blow up the economic system. But when your company shuts the doors and leaves you high and dry, you go home and the kids are still there. Yesterday things were fine. Today we are all in trouble.
Not long ago, you had a job and were planning on a better and better future. Then it all goes to hell.
You or your wife get sick and you go down the financial drain. Kids get sick, you go broke.
By the way, he was being judgmental about who he thinks should have kids. He presumes to be able to make decisions about other peoples lives.
It is a very condescending attitude.
Not true. Children can serve as a financial crutch later in life even here in America. At the same time it’s not a good choice to have one when you cannot afford to support yourself. It’s cetainly not a good choice to have one when you have no money for bare essentials like diapers.
I could easily turn it around ask you why you think it okay to ask childless couples to pay to feed the offspring of poor people but not okay for childless couples to ask for any subsidies to get treatment for a medical condition. Because that’s what infertility is: a medical condition. Why should anyone middle class be asked to shell out for food stamps for poor kids but get told they can’t get help if they want to have children of their own?
That’s what’s bizarre to me. Certainly a double standard.
I’m sorry. Where has anyone on this thread argued against coverage of contraceptives for medicaid patients?
People with infertility are not to blame for our fucked up medical coverage in this country.
You are ignoring the fact that many people are poor because they had children. Single mothers are far more likely to be poor than women who wait to have children. You could equally argue that they get punished even more. They do the responsible thing and wait and then when they run into trouble because they waited they get yelled at when they need help to conceive.
You seriously believe that by doing the right thing – yes, staying in school, not having a child until you’re past puberty and the like – that you won’t at least greatly up your odds of not being poor?
Me personally in poverty? No. I have nearly a million dollars in assets.
Look, I acknowledge that yes times suck right now. But why is it so hard for you to apparently admit that certain bad choices do increase the odds that you’ll be poor in life?
That does not describe most people and you know it.
I sent a pm to you three times including once last night before I went to bed. I also sent one to Loshan.
Eh. They’re out there. Just because YOU haven’t found one does not mean such jobs do not exist.
My husband and I are both, incredibly, watching his best friend and my best friend slide into poverty. It’s a horrifying slow process, exhausting (trying to keep afloat), and extremely difficult to get that free ride from welfare. Neither of them has kids, and I suppose if they did they;d be sitting pretty, huh? Otherwise, it’s applying for hundreds of shitty jobs without a nibble - their lives suck mightily.
No, they would not be “sitting pretty” if they had kids.
I guess this is a misconception left over from years ago, but children don’t buy you an automatic pass or gain you great amounts of money from the welfare system.
You might get a shockingly small monetary stipend, a little extra food help and maybe medical for the kidlet, but that’s about it on the extras. In addition, you still have to spend down/fall far enough to meet income and asset requirements to qualify for that.
ETA: The days of the “welfare queen” popping out babies every year to up their income are long gone.
Infertility is a medical condition, but having kids is a choice. Can you not see a difference between helping poor kids that are already here vs. helping to create hypothetical middle class kids? It’s like the difference between abortion, which is legal, and infanticide, which is murder.
You wrote “Single mothers,” but from context I think you might have meant “teen mothers.” Freudian slip? Single mothers come in all flavors. They don’t all pop out kids irresponsibly. Some are widows, for example. Nowadays you have professional women choosing to have kids on their own after they’ve established their careers, without any husbands. Single mothers are more likely to be poor, but only when the father abandons them.
Feeding the hungry is a matter of life and death. You personally reproducing is not.
Baldness is a medical condition but I don’t think treatments for it should be subsidized, either.
If people want to get infertility treatment as far as I’m concerned they can damn well pay for it themselves.
2 points here:
You can be poor and still NOT qualify for medicaid.
No one here had to say it - at least in my state medicaid does NOT cover contraception. At all. Period. Poor women in my state either find a way to cover the cost themselves or go without. For some, that means no sex and hoping to god they don’t get raped. For others, that means taking their chances when they do have sex, knowing if they do get pregnant they also have no means to pay for an abortion.
Even if we had single-payer medical coverage and universal coverage I’d be against the government paying for the infertile to reproduce, just as I’d be against them paying for women to get bigger boobs.
Funny thing - my spouse and I found we couldn’t have children of our own. So we decided life was pretty good anyway and having kids was not essential to happiness. So please, I’ve been there. Not all infertile couples are in agony over the lack of kids.
Why should society subsidize the children of the wealthy when clearly society resents subsidizing the children of the poor?
If having kids is so damn important to a woman she needs to make it a priority. That means, ideally, having them BEFORE she hits 30. Preferably mid-20’s. Yes, that might mean delaying a career or accepting she won’t earn as much in her lifetime, but she needs to decide which is more important to her: kids, or more money in the bank. That’s the dirty little secret girls are not told when they’re encouraged to pursue careers: if you delay having kids too long you won’t be able to have them at all. At least not your own, biological kids.
If you want to be as rich as possible having kids is a poor choice.
If you want kids of your own waiting until 35 or 40 to conceive is a poor choice. Given that the rate of problems goes up sharply at that age I’d also argue that it’s an irresponsible choice on a certain level as well.
Sorry, that’s the facts.
It will increase your odds but it guarantees nothing. As I have been saying, you can do everything right and still wind up poor.
Oh, please - don’t wind up a quadriplegic, you’ll go through that million in about 10 years, easy, if not sooner. Don’t get caught in a house fire and severely burned, that can cost several million to treat. Don’t get one of those cancers that can be treated long term but only with really, really expensive drugs - again, it will only take about 10 years to exhaust that million dollars. Injured or ill, could you bring enough money fast enough to replenish that?
Yes, you’re better off than most, but don’t kid yourself - it could still happen to you.
What I disagree with it the notion that EVERY poor person made bad choices. Quite a few of them didn’t - all that happened was they got sick, or got injured, or lost their job and couldn’t find another one quickly. Is it that hard to admit that that is true of millions of people right now?
No, you WISH it did, because it makes you feel safer to think that the people who are poor are those who screwed up, made bad decisions, and therefore somehow deserve it. If you ever thought that people who make good decisions could wind up destitute it would scare the hell out of you, because that means even you aren’t completely safe.
Well, hon, I never received any of them. Are you sure you’re doing it right? I’ve only received 1 PM in the past month and it wasn’t from you. I also checked my e-mail just in case you hit that by mistake - nothing from you there, either. Contact an admin if you’re having trouble or they just aren’t getting through.
Yes, yes, right now from my viewpoint you’re just another person blaming me because my old company downsized, and claiming to know where there is a job but refusing to share the information with me. You’ve claimed to have a lead on a stay-at-home job, you’ve claimed to have sent it to me, what, three or four times? But there’s nothing in my PM box or my e-mail, so what am I to believe?
