A. People who smoke crack can be logical and very intelligent.

B. Just the fact that some of you are talking about how you're in college then go on to imply you have no idea how someone can piss their life away shows me you have no clue how others have it. There are pre-teen kids out there who will not even come anywhere close to having the chance to go to college b/c of how shitty their lives are. They wouldn't even know where to start to attempt it.

So for some college educated, middle class know it all to act like he's got a grasp on poverty and it's effects on the ppl. who live it just shows the naivity.

derek bomar wrote:

majorspark wrote:

derek bomar wrote: I don't think someone who smokes crack has a logical thought process

And that is why I would not want to turn money over to them until they straighten themselves out.

good luck finding out the % of your dollars going to crackheads vs. non-crackheads, and then making it stop so that only non-crackheads receive your $

That is why I am against the federal government being in involved in welfare. It should be a state and local or private issue. Granted there is no way to assure no crackhead gets cash, but the smaller the group pooling their resources the less chance of it happening as there would be better oversight. Plus you have hundreds of different solutions (I bet you quite a few that are successful) as apposed to one for all.

I Wear Pants wrote: If you think most poor people want to be poor than you are an idiot and nothing I can say can help to change your mind or make you have more mental capacity.

I think "want," or even "choose," is too strong a word. Those are both volitional. What I think it really boils down to is apathy.

There ARE many people who are on welfare because they recognize that getting out of it will be the more difficult road to travel, and they honestly don't care enough about getting out to put that extra burden on themselves.

I live in a neighborhood where there is a LOT of poverty. I work with dozens and dozens of kids who live in households (can't call many of them "families" because of how they function ... or don't function) that are below the welfare line.

Some of the parents are working, but they are extremely limited in their own marketability because they did get pregnant (or get a girl pregnant) while in high school. While that is absolutely a choice, it is the choice of a fifteen- or sixteen-year-old child, who in many cases was never told about the repercussions of such actions. Hell, their parents don't care. Most of their teachers don't care. So they don't even learn to think ahead far enough to take their careers into consideration.

And as was stated earlier, there are cases of white, middle- or upper-class kids who knock up their girlfriends or get knocked up themselves as well (Bristol?). Their parents simply have the assets to help overcome that.

Many of the adults in my neighborhood would do things differently if they could go back and finish high school and/or go to college, because now they see the ramifications of their actions as middle teens. However, because nobody cared enough to TELL them about those ramifications WHILE they were middle teens, they didn't act with those consequences in mind while they were younger.

There are a lot of them who have simply reserved themselves to the idea that those actions they made earlier have determined where they are now ... that they are set in stone ... and thus, they don't even consider the notion of getting out of poverty as a reality.

chs71 wrote:People make decisions regarding school, drug use, pregnancy, and crime that cause their poverty.

Ask your average fifteen-year-old what they think about school. MOST don't want to be there, whether they are a suburbanite whose parents love and are able to take care of them or they are an urbanite whose father is gone and whose mother spends more nights at her boyfriend's house than she does at home with her teen or preteen kids, who basically live on their own while she's gone. I know I didn't want to be there.

However, I had parents who made sure I went. They made sure to explain to me why I had to go. They watched, and cared about, the grades I got.

It's a good thing, too. I was fifteen. I didn't give two piss squirts about most of those things.

Now, if I'd had parents who didn't care whether or not I went to school, never told me why it was important, and never spurred me to get good grades, what motivation would I have had to graduate with honors ... or even at all?

Maturity level needs to come into play when discussing this issue. Were the mistakes made while the person was young and immature, but the person has since developed a necessary work ethic and desire to climb out of their bad circumstances? If so, SOMEONE needs to help them get on their feet.

However, if the person is perpetuating their state, they should not be aided, as they are callously and ungratefully using other people's money to fund their own lazy lifestyle.

To paint "the poor" with a single brush ... or even a couple brushes ... though, is foolish, and would only be done by someone who doesn't know enough about the spectrum of the poor in society.

Strapping Young Lad wrote: So for some college educated, middle class know it all to act like he's got a grasp on poverty and it's effects on the ppl. who live it just shows the naivity.

You make one hell of a case here as to why big government should should not be involved when it come to helping those in need.

majorspark wrote:

Strapping Young Lad wrote: So for some college educated, middle class know it all to act like he's got a grasp on poverty and it's effects on the ppl. who live it just shows the naivity.

You make one hell of a case here as to why big government should should not be involved when it come to helping those in need.

+1000000000000000000

I definately believe there are people that need assistance, though I don't care to discuss it. But some random hero with wealthy parents, a computer and a college education: "It's so easy to graduate high school and go to college.....what's so hard about that? Look at me. My dad even bought me a Prius to get back and forth and put beer and food money directly into my account. What's so hard about it?"

I'm just saying there's so much more that goes into it. Shit I would have never even considered, hadn't someone taught it to me. It's just naive. The system is set up for people to fail and then we resent them when they do.

If you can't see that society is deformed, then I can't help you there.

^^^^ And then there are those of us who have had to take out loans and work OURSELVES through college, rather than wait for the government to hand a college education to us. Please don't lecture about being naive, because you are completely ignorant to most college students who go in massive debt to better their lives. Not everyone who goes to college had a privileged life either.

That's not even remotely close to what I'm talking about....

majorspark wrote:

Strapping Young Lad wrote: I don't necessarily feel the need to explore the topic in depth, but like I said many many factors act in one's abiltiy to "make it in life", from home life to nutrition. I don't necessarily believe that I need to make excuses for someone else' s situation but I also won't judge them. You may have had it rough, but IMO it's not your place or mine to determine how far someone else should go in life w/out understanding how they've had to live....

One thing to point out. When someone elses money is taken from them and given to someone who for whatever reason is in need of assistance, they should be judged as to how they are going to use the assistance. Is it merely going to subsidize their drug habbit? Or will having children out of wedlock just bring in more cash? If they are of the character that they are not going to change their activities that help facilitate their own poverty, then we by all means should make judgments on this and act accordingly.

You are categorizing many by the actions of some. Not all people that are on assistance are drug users or lazy. Some are, yes, but not every single one of them.

This is why I believe that the government should not use tax money for a welfare system. I believe that if we weren't taxed as much, we would set up assistance programs privately. The US is a very generous country. I also believe that if social assistance was privatized, it would be much more efficient and that the deserving people would get the deserving accomodations. Single mothers on minimum wage would get what they need through private organizations and drug addicts would get the help they need through private organizations. The government is not needed in such a large role IMO.

chs71 wrote:

I Wear Pants wrote: That doesn't mean they wanted to or choose to be poor. Most people do what they feel is the best option in a given circumstance, we're wrong a lot of the time but that doesn't mean we wanted or choose to be wrong. We just got beat.

So if I consider my best option to be to drop out of school, have a child without being married, and smoke crack then I am not choosing to do something wrong? That it's just bad luck if I end up poor?

I thought that I went to college, didn't have kids without being married, and don't use illegal drugs, had something to do with my economic success. Boy was I stupid. It's just a matter of luck! I should have dropped out and turned on long ago. I was a sucker.

I fail to see how not going to college and having kids out of wedlock makes someone any more or any less likely to be successful or not successful. I know many people who have had kids out of wedlock and are very successful. Same goes for people that haven't gone to college. I also know people who went to college and who had children in a marriage and are not successful. It all depends on the person.

Now I am not saying going to school doesn't increase a person's chances of being successful, but it is not a certainty. The children thing is irrelevant to the fullest.

bigmanbt wrote: ^^^^ And then there are those of us who have had to take out loans and work OURSELVES through college, rather than wait for the government to hand a college education to us. Please don't lecture about being naive, because you are completely ignorant to most college students who go in massive debt to better their lives. Not everyone who goes to college had a privileged life either.

I'm pretty sure without Mr. Evil Government I wouldn't be able to afford school.

I'm pretty sure without Mr. Evil Government I wouldn't be able to afford school.

Yeah, if it wasn't for the government backstopping and subsidizing student loans, there would a non-existent education loan market right now.

In alot of ways it is no different than Fannie and Freddy. The government makes the cost of higher education artificially low by distorting the student loan market in favor of more people getting loans than could ever dream of in a true free market. In fact, I would venture a guess that many of the people who have channeled their outrage towards those 2 financial institutions probably obtained a student loan at some point in their life, which is the educational equivalent of a sub-prime loan made possible by Uncle Sam and the Government's decision that school is good.

Any and all true free market conservatives should be advocates of banishing all government subsidies to banks to encourage them to make student loans, as it distorts the value of an education by making credit free to all like Fanny and Freddy did to home ownership. Giving anyone who wants a loan for school leads to education tuition inflation (just like the housing bubble) and will eventually create a similar bubble in our universities that will eventually burst.

Now I think student loan subsidies are good, but I just wanted to point that out to anyone patting themselves on the back for getting through school on the back of government assistance (loans) who in turn looks down on others that may be using government assistance of a different kind to help get them back on their feet who otherwise might now be able to without the help of the government program.

bigmanbt wrote: ^^^^ And then there are those of us who have had to take out loans and work OURSELVES through college, rather than wait for the government to hand a college education to us. Please don't lecture about being naive, because you are completely ignorant to most college students who go in massive debt to better their lives. Not everyone who goes to college had a privileged life either.

You're missing the point, and this is coming from someone who currently owes over $50K in school bills because he put himself through college.

It's not entirely that they can't. In many cases, it is that they haven't been told/taught/shown why they should. You easily make the connection: better education = better shot at a well-paying, stable career.

However, you were taught that by someone if you adopted it as a truth before you actually went to college.

Many in urban areas are never shown the importance of education. Why would they care about going to college? Their deadbeat parents never instilled the value of a good education in them. The school doesn't give two shits what happens to them BEFORE they graduate, let alone after.

Nobody is going to pick himself up by his own bootstraps until he sees merit in it. If these kids are never shown the benefits of a continued education, they will have no motivation to get one ... and honestly, there is no logical reason to blame them for such an outlook.

I Wear Pants wrote:

bigmanbt wrote: ^^^^ And then there are those of us who have had to take out loans and work OURSELVES through college, rather than wait for the government to hand a college education to us. Please don't lecture about being naive, because you are completely ignorant to most college students who go in massive debt to better their lives. Not everyone who goes to college had a privileged life either.

I'm pretty sure without Mr. Evil Government I wouldn't be able to afford school.

Interesting point, and a good one. I don't think I would have been able to go either if it wasn't for Mr. Stafford and Mr. Perkins.

dwccrew wrote:

majorspark wrote: One thing to point out. When someone elses money is taken from them and given to someone who for whatever reason is in need of assistance, they should be judged as to how they are going to use the assistance. Is it merely going to subsidize their drug habbit? Or will having children out of wedlock just bring in more cash? If they are of the character that they are not going to change their activities that help facilitate their own poverty, then we by all means should make judgments on this and act accordingly.

You are categorizing many by the actions of some. Not all people that are on assistance are drug users or lazy. Some are, yes, but not every single one of them.

I was speaking in context of the comments made concerning crackheads. I agree that not all those in need are. Thus my opinion that social issuues must be solved closest to the problem. Thats why I disagree with federal broad brush solutions. They are too far from the problems to have any lasting solutions. Also the constitution gives them no authority to enforce their solutions on all the citezenry of the Union. That is left to the states and the people under the 10th amendment.

dwccrew wrote: This is why I believe that the government should not use tax money for a welfare system. I believe that if we weren't taxed as much, we would set up assistance programs privately. The US is a very generous country. I also believe that if social assistance was privatized, it would be much more efficient and that the deserving people would get the deserving accomodations. Single mothers on minimum wage would get what they need through private organizations and drug addicts would get the help they need through private organizations. The government is not needed in such a large role IMO.

I wholeheartedly agree with this. You are 100% correct. This is the ideal solution to the social problems we face. If the federal government would get out the way and trust the citizenry to take care of themselves, the social strifes we face would be limited. This is how the founders envisioned it. Trusting the people to tend to their own needs, not have them dictated by far away Washington for all 300 million of its citizens. The vast majority of politicians in the federal government today will not allow this trust to be given to the people, not without it being pried from their cold dead fingers.

I work on a semi-regular basis with high-school kids and there are just those kids who ARE NOT going to college. They just have no clue. You see these kids and they are poor and they will remain poor for life. They'll live on the same poor street in the same neighborhood. That's it for them.

They have resource at school but they probably do not have the IQ and they certainly never had a parent to explain what people do after high school because their parents did nothing after school.

It sounds simple for you and I to go to college etc. but for these kids they might as well try to go to the moon. It's just not realistic for them. It's sad but it's really the truth and there's no denying that certain kids simply do not have the opportunities that you and I have.....

Part of the reason I'm choosing to ultimately work with kids in Jr. HS is so that maybe I can get to them before there so far past the point of no return, but I'm not banking on changing the world but I'm going to try to beat it into as many heads as I can that there is a way out.

However, I realize that the reason many ppl. work with kids is to make a difference, but ultimatley the system is a failure and ppl. eventually become disillusioned and things don't change. That's America for you.....

Holy shit it's 3 am!!!! Peace!

I Wear Pants wrote:

bigmanbt wrote: ^^^^ And then there are those of us who have had to take out loans and work OURSELVES through college, rather than wait for the government to hand a college education to us. Please don't lecture about being naive, because you are completely ignorant to most college students who go in massive debt to better their lives. Not everyone who goes to college had a privileged life either.

I'm pretty sure without Mr. Evil Government I wouldn't be able to afford school.

Actually, without the massive amount of student loans given out like candy, we wouldn't have hyper-inflation in that marketplace, and school would be more affordable to the many, not less.

Strapping Young Lad wrote:
They have resource at school but they probably do not have the IQ and they certainly never had a parent to explain what people do after high school because their parents did nothing after school.

It sounds simple for you and I to go to college etc. but for these kids they might as well try to go to the moon. It's just not realistic for them. It's sad but it's really the truth and there's no denying that certain kids simply do not have the opportunities that you and I have.....

Right, so what do you propose? As callous as it may sound, some people are cut out to dig ditches. Because genetics aren't fair, opportunities won't be fair, and there's nothing the gov't can do about that, short of handicapping some of us (starts sound familiar).

I find nothing wrong with ditch digging (if that's really a job anymore), or garbage man, or fast food worker....just WORK, have a job...get up in the morning with a purpose.

I wish the government would realize that not everyone is cut of for college, then instead they could have more trade schools, instead of wasting time and money sending kids off to "school" who shouldn't be there in the first place.

Realisitically, I'd say maybe 25% of the people in college should be there, the rest are just filling time. But since college became a big business, this will never change.
It is sort of like the governement wanting everyone to own a house, but some people can't even take care of themselves, let alone a house.

I Wear Pants wrote: Way to take things to the extreme. But yeah, I guess you're right, everyone who is poor is poor because they're big dumb pieces of shit crackheads who had kids when they were fifteen and dropped out of school.

But that is exactly the point. The largest number of poor in the United States lack a high school education, live in single parent homes, and illegal drugs are present. Those people probably wish they were rich, but they chose to do things which have caused their poverty.

fan_from_texas wrote:

Strapping Young Lad wrote:
They have resource at school but they probably do not have the IQ and they certainly never had a parent to explain what people do after high school because their parents did nothing after school.

It sounds simple for you and I to go to college etc. but for these kids they might as well try to go to the moon. It's just not realistic for them. It's sad but it's really the truth and there's no denying that certain kids simply do not have the opportunities that you and I have.....

Right, so what do you propose? As callous as it may sound, some people are cut out to dig ditches. Because genetics aren't fair, opportunities won't be fair, and there's nothing the gov't can do about that, short of handicapping some of us (starts sound familiar).

What I propose is not resenting the poor and not claiming they are poor because they want to be poor.....

Of course, not everyone has to go to college, nor can go. There are plenty of jobs that don't require an education that society needs people to have. That's not the point.

The original claim is that the poor want to be poor, but that's not necessarily true. They theoretically can move from one class to another, but that's not realistic for many....

Strapping Young Lad wrote: They theoretically can move from one class to another, but that's not realistic for many....

The percentage of poor who leave the lower economic class hovers between 75 and 80%, and has for longer than either of us have been alive.

The poor stay with us, but overwhelmingly, they are not the same people from generation to generation.

chs71 wrote: But that is exactly the point. The largest number of poor in the United States lack a high school education, live in single parent homes, and illegal drugs are present. Those people probably wish they were rich, but they chose to do things which have caused their poverty.

I don't think they necessarily choose to have one parent. They don't choose to have an uneducated parent. They don't choose to be exposed to drugs. These things, whether you want to belive it or not, have an effect on a child.

If you grow up in that environment, you will do the same thing because that's what you understand.

chs71 wrote:

I Wear Pants wrote: Way to take things to the extreme. But yeah, I guess you're right, everyone who is poor is poor because they're big dumb pieces of shit crackheads who had kids when they were fifteen and dropped out of school.

But that is exactly the point. The largest number of poor in the United States lack a high school education, live in single parent homes, and illegal drugs are present. Those people probably wish they were rich, but they chose to do things which have caused their poverty.

How exactly does a child have a choice, on whether both parents will be present, whether he'll live in a nice neighborhood?

Unless you're Stewie from Family Guy, i doubt a child is going to choose to live in a single-parent home.

queencitybuckeye wrote:

Strapping Young Lad wrote: They theoretically can move from one class to another, but that's not realistic for many....

The percentage of poor who leave the lower economic class hovers between 75 and 80%, and has for longer than either of us have been alive.

The poor stay with us, but overwhelmingly, they are not the same people from generation to generation.

Link? I call shenanigans.

queencitybuckeye wrote:

Strapping Young Lad wrote: They theoretically can move from one class to another, but that's not realistic for many....

The percentage of poor who leave the lower economic class hovers between 75 and 80%, and has for longer than either of us have been alive.

Where did you pull those numbers from?

Unsubstantiated data removed from thread.