I'm becoming one of them...

The BBQ Pit
61

I grew up in a very lower middle class family and my parents spent all their money to send us to Catholic schools. We went to school with the children of extremely upper middle class parents. A lot of auto executeive’s kids. I looked with envy at their nice clothes, nice cars, fancy vacations, etc. We didn’t even have heat most winters. My biggest memory of childhood is wearing damp clothes and always being cold because we couldn’t afford a clothes drier or enough clothes to hang them to dry. I thought my whole life “when I grow up I’m going to have all that”.

Well, I’m all grown up and I don’t want any of that. I want to live a comfortable life where I’m warm, fed, clothed, and have enough money left over at the end of the month to save for retirement and enjoy some extras. If I see a name brand for twice the cost of a generic I’m going to give the generic a try. I have plenty of extra money to buy name brands but what’s the point if the cheaper one makes me just as satisfied? Marshmallow Mateys taste exactly like Lucky Charms. If I could only teach my kids one thing it would be that just because you can afford it doesn’t mean you need to buy it. All Americans would be better off if they learned that.

I think you’re just going through a stage. Someday, I suspect, your spending style will be more in line with your parents than with that of your new peers. Just the fact that it upsets you to feel this way means you probably will get over it.

Oh, and the book thing. Just be happy that they read. There’s nothing wrong with best sellers, not every book has to be an intellectual challenge to be worthwhile.

62

One part of growing up is learning on which items it’s a good thing to cut corners and buy the cheap thing, and on which items it’s better to buy the name brand.

It’s all about priorities.

63

As far as disposable income goes, I was richer as an undergrad than I was as a grad student. I had scholarships up the wazoo that paid tuition, books, and living expenses. My father foot the dorm bill and car insurance. The money I got from my part-time job was mostly do-what-I-want money. Fortunately, I was frugal and low-maintenance, but I could have had more fun, if I had wanted.

I used to think there was such thing as a “college experience”, but now I realize that it doesn’t exist, especially now with some many different kids going to college. Many college kids work to support themselves at least partially. Many college kids live with their parents, either out of financial necessity or preference. Many college kids have scholarships whereas just as many have taken out loans or have their parents’ helping out. I think it’s kinda unfair to tell someone who deviates from the image of a “typical” college student that they are missing out on some kind of experience.

64

Oh, how I loathe to hear the words “working class” dripping with disgust…

Homework assignment for all you guilt-ridden college students: Go out and read Howard Zinn’s A People’s History of the United States. Listen to some Woody Guthrie or Utah Phillips. Learn about what it means to be working class and what your family’s contributions to the world you’re living in have been before you judge them so harshly.

It’s not wrong to want something better for yourself–heck, that’s what your parents want for you, too!–but you are mistaken if you think that being working/lower class means the bar for you has been set too low for you to even acknowledge. Quite honestly, we should be lucky to amass a quarter of the accomplishments of some of our working-class heroes with only half as much against us.

65

I buy generics all the time so I have more money to spend on pretentious novels. YMMV of course, but I don’t see what’s wrong with generics. To me it’s just common sense to buy the cheapest brand there is; it’s what I was always taught and what I’ve always done. But then, I never much cared about the eating habits of my more well to do peers.

66

The value of a thing is not measured only in dollars and cents.

All the bought-and-paid-for simulated authenticity in the world will still only create a space devoid of memory… filled with objects but ultimately empty.

67

Wild idea - get a job, save some money, buy yourself a car? What a weird sense of entitlement to think your parents owe you a car. I drove a beater in college that I paid for myself (although my parents were merciful and kept me on their insurance until I graduated college) and didn’t have a brand shiny new car until I had a “real” job (7 years after college ended).

I’m also amused by your disdain for your parents frugality “even when they didn’t have to.” How long do you think they’ve been saving for your 4 years of 40K education? cough 160,000 dollars!!!

68

This thread just will not get out of my mind. I usually don’t care what other people do but I just have to say a few things. If you have a scholarship, or are paying for most of your own fees, or your parents are making you go to that college ignore the following.

40,000 dollars a year for college. Do you have any concept of the value of money? Most people in America, after taxes, will not make that much money in one year. One of your parents is probably working for nothing so you can go to that school. I don’t know what you’re studying but I’m pretty sure there’s no need for you to go to such an expensive college. People who go to 40,000 dollar a year colleges don’t get any farther in life than people who go to cheaper colleges. It might get you a good first job but so will good grades at a regular school.

I think you should be embarrassed of yourself for even taking so much of their money. Like Glory said, get a job. I think you would be happier studying somewhere else where other people spending “stupid money” won’t make you feel so deprived.

Of course your attitudes are formed by your parents so you’re not totally to blame.

69

NinjaChick indicates she is aware of and struggling with her issues, so she doesn’t really need preaching and nagging from us.

70

Yep, sorry, I shouldn’t have said some of that.

I stand by my suggestion to switch schools. The only real problem you have is the type of students at your school. Do you think you would be having these thoughts at all if you went somwhere else? Go somehwere else, maybe your parents could help you out with a good used car then. Get a part time job in a field related to your major. You’ll be way ahead of where you would be at the expensive school with no job, way ahead when you look for a real job and way ahead in maturity.

I know what it’s like, I went to high school with the super affluent and it’s really easy to get sucked into the whole “you are your possesions” mindset. If you’re really afraid that you are “becoming one of them” escape before it’s too late.

71

Not to speak for her, but yes, I think she would be having these thoughts if she went anywhere else. It’s a common thing to go through whilst growing up. Thing is, she’s aware of it and realizes she has to go through it to be able to get over it.

And she goes to St. John’s College, I believe. There is no traditional major, it’s a true Classics education. I really can’t think of any other school in the nation she could transfer to and get the same education.

72

Holy crap my entire undergrad and graduate education added up all together didn’t cost that. That is one expensive school. I mean, I’m sure it’s a great college and all, but damn. No wonder you feel inferior; I think even looking at a picture of this rich-ass school would make me want to crawl in a hole and die.

73

Do NOT switch schools!

I graduated 3rd in a class of 12000, with 780s and 790s in my GREs. I did not get into graduate school. There were three reasons:

  1. I was trying to get into Clinical Psych, a program which has far more applicants than acceptees.

  2. I was almost 40.

  3. I went to Temple, NOT a prestige school (Temple has some prestigious graduate programs, but its undergraduate program is not at all selective).

The only one of these three reasons that was ever mentioned to me by a graduate school was the third. It’s not my imagination.
As for the incipient snobbery you feel about money, NinjaChick, I wouldn’t sweat it unless it causes you to treat your family any differently from the way you did before. You will find, I suspect, despite the near-universal devotion to the concept that every person is equally valuable, yada, yada, that you will evaluate people on a variety of standards unique to you, just as everyone else does - and like them, admire them, wish to emulate them - or not, dependent on those. That’s what we ALL do. And those standards will change many times throughout your life. It’s less to do with maturity per se than it is to do with your experiences - as you go through more of your life, you will find that the things that you value in others will change as your experiences cause you to develop. That’s one of the main reasons we have so many divorces, I think.

But I must say your current choice of snobbery a bit strange to me. True class snobbery, IMO, would call for you to appreciate economical living. Throwing money around with no thought of value as compared to cost is tacky. I think if you visited the homes of many of your fellow students, you would find their parents and families far less admirable than your own. And you can take pride in the fact that your family has *earned * what it has, not inherited it through no merit but that of lucky birth, or some of what appear to me to be the outrageously lucky and/or morally questionable ways that some people become very wealthy. Any fellow student who looks down his or her nose at you is simply displaying his or her own gross immaturity. And I’ll bet, if you could ever find out for sure, you’d find that those are very few - most of your fellow students would either be indifferent or even a little envious of your coming up the (comparatively) hard way.

That being said, it’s hardly unnatural or even sinful to feel a little envy for your fellow students who can have anything they want without any concern as to whether or not they can afford it, or even to feel a little resentment that you can’t do the same. As long as you recognize that the resentment is both irrational and undeserved when applied to your parents, and conduct yourself accordingly, you’re fine. Let’s face it - we don’t have control over our feelings, and we all often have feelings that are less than “nice.” As long as we don’t let them control our behavior, we’re fine.

It may help to bear in mind that you’re hardly hurting. You’re at a top-notch school, you apparently have your own computer, your family is (as has been pointed out) far more intellectually sophisticated than the average Joe (they read, they have chosen beautiful nature scenes for their decor), and you live in a solid, reasonably well-maintained house. At your school and in your life, you have no exposure to the squalor and ignorance that is the everyday life of most of the truly poor. Your parents bought generics when they didn’t “need” to? At least they could make the mortgage (hell, they *had * a mortgage!) when one of their kids was sick or the car broke down. Your family life was not lived in a state of perpetual financial crisis. Your parents knew and cared who were their governor, their senators, what was going on in the world outside their immediate environment. Compared to a disgracefully large percentage of our population, you were and are very well off.

74

Um, what?

If her parents are footing the bill willingly and she’s not wasting it away, she has no need to be ashamed or embarrassed. Sheesh, just because you had to walk up a 6-mile long hill barefooted in the snow doesn’t mean everyone has to! NinjaChick has her whole life to be independent and penniless. Why should she make the next four years of her life harder than it has to be?

Perhaps her parents are frugal because they are straining to put NinjaChick through college. Perhaps they are frugal because that’s just how they are. I’m sure NinjaChick is grateful for her parents, but it’s only human nature to compare one’s set of circumstances with another’s, even if you do know why they are different.

But I do recommend getting a part-time job, NinjaChick, at least until your first two years are completed. A job gives you pocket money (save up for a car?), job skills, and it will make you feel less burdensome. Plus, it will make you feel like you’re not just another “spoiled rich kid”.

75

Maybe she doesn’t deserve a superharsh response, but I don’t recall reading that NC is actively doing anything about her changing values. So, rather than waiting around to be a grown up, she could use this opportunity to educate herself.

76

Just realized I ought to clarify: We’re not paying 40K per year, that’s the “sticker price”. We’re paying somewhere more in the range of 12K (because my school’s financial aid office quite frankly rocks).

I do have a job through work-study, and I am saving pretty much 90% of all my income, because I’m going to graduate with a shitload of debt.

I am extremely grateful to my parents: I know all too well that they’ve made huge sacrifices so that I can go to college. (I also know that there was never any question as to whether or not I would - they’re both first-generation college-goers in their family and think that getting a 4-year degree is the Most Important Thing In the World, Ever, Period, No Questions Asked.) They want me at the best school possible, and I give them credit for that.

zweisamkeit is right about my school: There very literally is no other program like it in the world, and I don’t have a “major” per se. A major-related job is sort of an impossibility, unfortunately.

77

(meant to tack this on to my previous response)

This is true (and Zinn kicks ass, IMO). The “working class” is extrodinarily important and has done a hell of a lot. In a way, I guess I’m proud to be part of that*.

On the other hand, the ‘working class’ is just that: working. It’s not pretty, it’s not flashy, it’s not glorious or particularly comfortable. No one wishes that they were working class. What you want to be is rich, comfortable, and elegant. Working class isn’t, really, any of those.

*Up until probably my grandmother’s generation, neither side of my family was ‘working class’. Most of my maternal ancestors came from Ireland with literally a few dollars and the clothes on their backs. My paternal ancestors were all Eastern european Jews, which has never really lent itself to anything much more than being alive.

78

I never said she should be independent and penniless now (and I never had to walk in the snow barefoot). But she’s the one who came on here and told everyone that she’s accepting a large amount of money from her parents for education and that she’s embarrassed of them and the sacrifices they made to pay for her. She should be embarrasssed that she is accepting money that they stuggled to save when she isn’t willing to help out the least little bit. Sorry if that’s a little harsh, but that’s how I feel.

Our parents don’t owe us their going into deep debt or second mortgaging the house or spending their returement for our education. Even if they’re willing we should think carefully about accepting and make every effort to help out.

79

OK…simulpost. I take most of what I said back. The OP was very misleading about amounts of money.

80

And that’s the attitude you have to shed. Everyone wants more money, no doubt. But I guarantee you that there are millions of ‘working class’ people who are happy being there, and wouldn’t want to be ‘elegant’.

I still consider myself ‘working class’, and I wouldn’t have it any other way. I have zero desire to be part of the jet-set. My desires involve seeing my daughter have a good life, having a happy family, friends, hobbies I enjoy, and a career that is rewarding. The trappings of wealth mean absolutely nothing to me, other than that I would like to have the means to buy toys I think I would have fun with. But that’s no big deal compared to the big ones - health, family, friends, and enough money to live a comfortable life.