Reply #79: Most Poor people i know don't have the time to make poor choices [View All]

[Tsiyu]

But poor choices are made for them every day. An employee who shows up on time, does his job and only makes 6.50 an hour has to keep that job because he doesn't have transportation to take him off the mountain. He just had surgery, but without insurance he can't afford his necessary meds. So he misses a few nights of work here and there and puts his health further in danger. Everyone else in the community gets away with paying grown women and men like him shit wages, so they all do it and get away with it.

They are saying, in effect, screw this community. I'm going to suck the life force out of the workers and make sure they don't get paid enough to support many of the local businesses. I'm going to pay them so little, in fact, that they have to take some form of public assistance to get by, EVEN WHEN THEY WORK 40 HOURS A WEEK!!!!!!!! How is that "making poor choices" on the part of the poor person?

What does the poor person do when there are low wages and only low wages for miles around, even if that worker deserves more and is worth more but has no other choice but to stay in that community?

If they give up and say, "Screw it" they are "lazy." If they stay they are practicing "learned helplessness?" Give me a break! How about the CEO is the lazy ass and the corporate payroll Scrooges are practicing "learned avarice?"

The company that hires humans as if it is hiring machines or beasts, and that pays them pennies compared to what the business owners and CEOs skim off the business every day, are at fault for making poor choices for the communities in which they do business and from which they hire a workforce. They say, "screw the public welfare, I'm getting mine, and if people don't like it, they don't have to work here."

When you're hungry and you want to pay your own way, you take that shit job because it's the only one around for miles and the company knows it can get away with abusing you.

And for every person or couple I've known who've made poor choices - financing vehicles, furniture rentals, huge clothes or party budget - I know 20 poor people who haven't got a thing on credit, but a medical condition or accident wiped out savings. Should they have made a better, more financially stable choice by denying their child needed surgery and medical care? Or let Granny die rather than have a bypass? Perhaps someone like you has absolutely no clue how our health care system bankrupts people.

When medical services are only available to the wealthy, how does a poor person practice "learned helpfulness?" Can you explain, Ron_Green? Maybe you read above that my son was in a wreck (it was friday morning they tell me but I'm out of it.) He's been laying here suffering til a friend whose dad is a Doc made him come to the office and they are providing care for free. Unbelievable but there are really good hearts out there. But what if we didn't know this wonderful kid and dad?

We also lucked out in a bizarre twist and my new neighbor works at the wrecker so he arranged a deep discount knowing insurance might not cover. (So nice way to make up with neighbors, too.)

I rely on good friends and neighbors, and so does nearly everyone here who is poor. We know how to survive. And none of us is trying to beg food at restaurants, the way the children of the welathy do ALL THE TIME up here.

Believe me, if the bottom drops out, we poor folks know how to make it. It will be the self-assured Yuppies - who claim this vast superiority when it comes to choice-making - who will be wondering how to find food and keep their cars running.