interesting article

[Crystal J]

I don't think there is a good answer on how to deal with a struggling family with low income. I have a friend who is a single mom with two kids and works as a nanny for $10/hour and struggles to get by. She does get a little bit in food stamps and a medical card. She wants to get a better job, so we sat down one day to figure out what kind of job she would qualify for that would pay more then she makes now, so upon searching classified adds and looking into it - there is nothing unless she will willing to work 2nd or 3rd shift which with two kids she can't.

So now what? The "get a better job" response was what job that I am qualified for? She is now going back to school on-line at the local junior college and is almost done with her 1st year which was paid for with grants. I am a big fan of trade schools for those who would not succeed in the traditional college education path and I don't think that route is encouraged enough.

 

[Figaro928]

You missed the point. The basic gist of the story was to contrast the "magical world" vs reality. Mere miles away from the Happiest Place on Earth, people don't have a home and it's becoming a bigger issue. Maybe buck up on the reading comprehension.

Wow. Maybe buck up on being polite?!? My point was mere miles away EVERYTHING people are struggling. Just because Disney touts itself as "the most magical place on Earth" doesn't mean that the magic should carry over to everything in it's zipcode. I comprehend the article just fine, thank you. I just happen to disagree with mentioning Disney for, what seems like, the sake of mentioning Disney.

 

[slappy magoo]

You missed the point. The basic gist of the story was to contrast the "magical world" vs reality. Mere miles away from the Happiest Place on Earth, people don't have a home and it's becoming a bigger issue. Maybe buck up on the reading comprehension.

They could have just as easily reported on homelessness or income inequality in NYC, where people live on the streets in the shadows of buildings where billions of dollars are moved around like Monopoly money.
They could have just as easily reported on homelessness or income inequality in the shadows of Hollywood, "The dream factory," where happy endings are manufactured on a regular basis.
They could have just as easily reported on homelessness or income inequality in oil-rich Dallas. Or Vegas or Atlantic City. Or lands surrounding Native American casinos where money flows freely around a narrow radius and rarely breaks out the next outlying circle.
It's not as valid of a point (that you think others are missing) if it's not a unique point in the first place.
What's happening in Orlando is not unique.

 

[slappy magoo]

Exactly. I have no solutions. I have no answers. I give a "it is what it is" attitude and I hate it.

I was born middle class, I stayed middle class, and short of winning the lotto, I'll die middle class. I'm cool with that. I work a mediocre full time job, pay my taxes and scrimp and save for a Disney vacation. I feel sympathetic to those less fortunate than my family and grateful for what we do have.

However it doesn't take the sting away from working hard at being one of the "haves" and seeing the "have nots" being handed everything. Furthermore, as mentioned previously, I work in the healthcare field in a very low income area. It's extremely frustrating to see low income people have what I would consider luxuries - name brand clothes; newest smart phone; manicures etc. What dismal pay they do make becomes spending money. It's not spent on groceries or rent or anything that the middle class budgets into their income. Again I have no solution - just merely stating that it stings

And you're right - it's a fustercluck anyway you look at it.

Define "everything."

I mean, I'm sure some people know how to game the system and get more from the government than their equally or more desperate neighbors. But that's human nature - show me ANY system, I'll find someone who knows how to game it, whether it's someone getting more food stamps than they ought to get or a CEO who diverts his income throughout the company so it seems like he only gets paid a dollar a year so he pay no income taxes on his vast wealth. But to imply that every person who gets help from the government is living large compared to people who work for a living is to believe what is by and large a myth perpetrated by people who want you to be angry at the poor folk and not at the people who are keeping them poor (what a coincidence, often they're the same people).

 

[PhotoDave219]

You missed the point. The basic gist of the story was to contrast the "magical world" vs reality. Mere miles away from the Happiest Place on Earth, people don't have a home and it's becoming a bigger issue. Maybe buck up on the reading comprehension.

It goes a lot further than that.

People were middle-class & have a couple kids that are surviving… Not necessarily saving but surviving… And then somebody loses a job. And then the house gets foreclosed on. Yes, people can declare bankruptcy but at the end of the day you still need survived… You still need a place to live.

So here we are five or six years after the supposed economic recovery and we still have people living in motels because they can't afford anything else.

It's beyond the shadow of Disney World… This is just a microcosm of what American society has become.

 

[Figaro928]

Define "everything."

I mean, I'm sure some people know how to game the system and get more from the government than their equally or more desperate neighbors. But that's human nature - show me ANY system, I'll find someone who knows how to game it, whether it's someone getting more food stamps than they ought to get or a CEO who diverts his income throughout the company so it seems like he only gets paid a dollar a year so he pay no income taxes on his vast wealth. But to imply that every person who gets help from the government is living large compared to people who work for a living is to believe what is by and large a myth perpetrated by people who want you to be angry at the poor folk and not at the people who are keeping them poor (what a coincidence, often they're the same people).

@slappy magoo - Your thoughts are very well thought out and well written. Thank you for suckering me into a Friday afternoon conversation that makes me think.

When I say "everything" it's a personal outlook. I see everything that my family pays on a weekly or monthly basis handed out to others. When I see government assistant programs for groceries, rent, health insurance, school grants (vs my student loans), day care, cell phone bills yes that encompasses 75% of my monthly budget. I know people work any system they can. And I'm in no way "angry" at the people below the poverty line who do. I'm not angry that they do, I'm frustrated that they can . If I had a government, or rich uncle or anonymous donor paying for 75% of what is now my monthly budget I would rock a sweet weekly mani/pedi, the newest Nike kicks and IPhone 12 .

 

[slappy magoo]

@slappy magoo - Your thoughts are very well thought out and well written. Thank you for suckering me into a Friday afternoon conversation that makes me think.

When I say "everything" it's a personal outlook. I see everything that my family pays on a weekly or monthly basis handed out to others. When I see government assistant programs for groceries, rent, health insurance, school grants (vs my student loans), day care, cell phone bills yes that encompasses 75% of my monthly budget. I know people work any system they can. And I'm in no way "angry" at the people below the poverty line who do. I'm not angry that they do, I'm frustrated that they can . If I had a government, or rich uncle or anonymous donor paying for 75% of what is now my monthly budget I would rock a sweet weekly mani/pedi, the newest Nike kicks and IPhone 12 .

"About 12 percent of the federal budget in 2013, or $398 billion, supported programs that provide aid (other than health insurance or Social Security benefits) to individuals and families facing hardship. Spending on safety net programs declined in both nominal and real terms between 2012 and 2013 as the economy continued to improve.
These programs include: the refundable portions of the Earned Income Tax Credit and Child Tax Credit, which assist low- and moderate-income working families through the tax code; programs that provide cash payments to eligible individuals or households, including Supplemental Security Income for the elderly or disabled poor and unemployment insurance; various forms of in-kind assistance for low-income families and individuals, including SNAP (food stamps), school meals, low-income housing assistance, child care assistance, and assistance in meeting home energy bills; and various other programs such as those that aid abused and neglected children.

Such programs keep millions of people out of poverty each year. A CBPP analysis shows that government safety net programs kept some 41 million people out of poverty in calendar year 2012. Without any government income assistance, either from safety net programs or other income supports like Social Security, the poverty rate would have been 29.1 percent in 2012, nearly double the actual 16 percent."

http://www.cbpp.org/cms/?fa=view&id=1258

Granted, that doesn't make you feel better when you see someone at the checkout line at the supermarket scrolling through an iphone while their kids play with portable video games and she's paying for the groceries with a SNAP card (assuming of course that' the sort of thing you ARE seeing). But again, there are people who want you to indeed think all your tax dollars are going to welfare cheats and drug dealers. It's such an incomplete and inaccurate portrayal of who need assistance (and how much of it they're getting) that to perpetuate that stereotype as the norm should be criminal.

Meanwhile, 19% of your tax dollars goes to defense and international security assistance. I certainly hope you get as angry when you read about weapons manufacturer lobbying for and receiving money to build weapons and vehicles even the Pentagon insists they don't need as much anymore.

 

[Figaro928]

Granted, that doesn't make you feel better when you see someone at the checkout line at the supermarket scrolling through an iphone while their kids play with portable video games and she's paying for the groceries with a SNAP card (assuming of course that' the sort of thing you ARE seeing). But again, there are people who want you to indeed think all your tax dollars are going to welfare cheats and drug dealers. It's such an incomplete and inaccurate portrayal of who need assistance (and how much of it they're getting) that to perpetuate that stereotype as the norm should be criminal.

Meanwhile, 19% of your tax dollars goes to defense and international security assistance. I certainly hope you get as angry when you read about weapons manufacturer lobbying for and receiving money to build weapons and vehicles even the Pentagon insists they don't need as much anymore.

HAHA no, it doesn't make me feel better Just as a point of reference, the sort of thing I'm seeing - kid you not saw it today - are single women in their young twenties excited about their expected 3rd child because it's that much more government money they get. Paraphrasing today's observation to keep it as politically correct as possible, "I hope this one's slow because Sue has a slow child and she gets an extra check a month because of it" Meanwhile my husband and I are holding back on any additions to our family because I need to work full time & day care is expensive and maternity leave is a joke and etc etc. Again, I'm not angry that that woman thinks that way or lives that way, but that our society almost encourages her to think that way. No, Lockheed Martin isn't dangling a new multi-million dollar missile in my face and I have no idea what their intentions are. I would assume that weapon manufactures based in the US supply both blue and white collar US jobs though. And I realize I've become cynical over these personal issues while I've stayed blissfully ignorant over others. I would probably get very angry over many many many issues if I knew their whole truths.

I'm trying to tie this all back to WDW somehow, but my brain hurts.... how about "it's a great big beautiful tomorrow!"

 

[zooey]

You know, I should be smarter than to wade into a thread that is going to be politically charged, but this topic just angers me so because it is fluffed off as irresponsible people who should get better jobs and pay their bills and why is everyone picking on Disney BS.

I'm sorry to my rightwinged pals, but Disney doesn't pay living wages to the vast majority of its CMs. And as the largest employer in the state of Florida, maybe just maybe they bear some responsibility when their workers are living 3-4-5 to a room in old motels on US 192 to avoid being homeless.

I really don't want to hear that people can simply get better jobs because that is ignorant beyond all rational thought. It would be nice if it were true, but the reality is it isn't. And people get into lives that trap you like quicksand, just because it has never happened to you doesn't make it untrue or something made up by the media.

If you knew how many adult Americans were unemployed, underemployed or just plain gave up on life, then you might be spurred to actually do something about it. You know, something real ... not say praying for them.

Much better to blame people for being lazy or making poor choices. Those same defenses were what were used in the economic collapse of 2008. You know, the one caused by greedy people charging up credit cards and buying $500,000 homes when they could only afford $170,000 ones. It had nothing at all to do with government policies that allowed banks to lie and make things up and sell financial products that existed in the same way Pixie Dust does.

UGH!!!! ... Seriously, let @slappy magoo battle this. I've got a vacation coming up and really have no desire to battle against insanity.

Well said.

 

[ChrisM]

The frustrating thing about this whole conversation is that both sides of the argument are valid to a limited point, but subscribing yourself fully to one side or another just means you are half wrong. There are external factors that keep the lower class immobile, but there are also internal factors as well.

There is quite a bit of sociological research that show the way lower classes view money makes it extremely difficult to pull themselves out of that lifestyle. There is a mentality of "spend it now because it might be gone tomorrow" that is pervasive because it's compounded by the society around the lower class promoting that behavior and simple human nature of wanting a temporary release from the stresses of daily life (a poor person's iPhone you think they shouldn't afford is a middle class person's vacation). That in and of itself shows the dichotomy of the situation. The situation both is and isn't the fault of the lower class.

Externally, you have the very real issue of corporations paying less than they should, but is the rest of society willing to see a multiplicative increase in the price of common goods so someone can have a "living wage"? Or would they just stop buying those goods therefor lowering demand? Also, what is a living wage? Who decides how much of a house you deserve? How many kids you get to have? What type of car and when can it get replaced? That is some Orwellian stuff right there. There is also going to be a part of society who can't overcome what I described in the secondparagraph, so by mandating a living wage, you would just have the irony of richer poor people.

It's a complicated issue with no right answer and lots of wrong ones.

This is, quite literally, the only worthwhile post in this entire thread. There are certainly a dozen or so very earnest and well-intentioned posts in here as well, but they're really nothing more than self-serving blather.

The cold, depressing fact is that there will always be a low income segment of the population. But we need to break that concept out to clarify the various circumstances at play.

There will always be X percent of a population who are (due to physical or mental deficiency, injury, or untreatable behavioral issues) incapable of working or otherwise being productive or participating members of society. This group will always need to be cared for by some mechanism, either governmental or otherwise. The only real dispute most reasonable people would have about this segment is the most appropriate mechanism for which to address this population.

There will also always be Y percent of a population that have similar issues to the group above, but can be counseled, rehabilitated, or educated to bring themselves into some level of self-sufficiency and productivity. These folks would benefit from programs, governmental or otherwise, tasked with assisting them in the pursuit of self-sufficiency. The group tends to cause a little more of a stir between competing ideologies insofar as what is the appropriate amount of resources allocated to filling these needs and the level of accountability involved in the process, but usually there is agreement that it is worthwhile to assist this group.

Then there is the Z percent of the population; the group that causes the most consternation. While I believe this is actually two somewhat distinct sub-groups, they all fall into the same problem area: people who, by dint of circumstances and decision-making, can't seem to put it together. Maybe they ran with the wrong crowd for a time and ended up with a criminal record. Maybe their parents were substance abusers or slugs and were deprived of opportunities and any sort of decent role models. Maybe they were a teenage parent, got tossed out of the house, and just could never get things put together due to all of the associated trials and trauma. Maybe the inexorable tide of the global economy left them with bleak job prospects. Maybe they just had the worst run of luck you could possibly imagine. These are tough cases with no easy answers and you're going to hear the usual appeals from both sides...everything from what a tragedy/victim these people are to why can't they just put in the work and pull themselves up from their bootstraps?

The problems this country faces are vast. Our answer to every perceived problem is money. And our apparent preferred mechanism for action is government. It's not my problem, so in order to fix something we rely on the government to extract money from the populace to subsequently throw at the problem. The problems with this approach are evident in this very thread. Government is always pretty much the least effective and least efficient agent for obtaining results and people get angry when the money they provide to the government subsequently appears to be wasted. And even more angry when they are then required to give more.

And these problems are only going to get worse as technological change causes even more upheavals in the labor market. The value of domestic manual labor plummeted when access to the global labor markets truly opened up in the 70's. The value of global manual labor is going to similarly plummet with advances in robotics and artificial intelligence over the next 30 years. It will be convulsive to society at large and that Group Z will become even more of an issue.

The one small candle in this storm is that, despite the dire talk about income disparity these days being at an all time high (and likely getting even worse in light of the labor prognostications above), poverty in a real sense - the actual basket of goods and services consumed - is truly on its way to being eliminated. Measures of poverty by currency value are largely meaningless; rather, compare the overall health and lifestyle of someone considered to be "poor" today to that of one living 50 years ago. The difference is stark.

 

[jakeman]

This is, quite literally, the only worthwhile post in this entire thread. There are certainly a dozen or so very earnest and well-intentioned posts in here as well, but they're really nothing more than self-serving blather.

The cold, depressing fact is that there will always be a low income segment of the population. But we need to break that concept out to clarify the various circumstances at play.

There will always be X percent of a population who are (due to physical or mental deficiency, injury, or untreatable behavioral issues) incapable of working or otherwise being productive or participating members of society. This group will always need to be cared for by some mechanism, either governmental or otherwise. The only real dispute most reasonable people would have about this segment is the most appropriate mechanism for which to address this population.

There will also always be Y percent of a population that have similar issues to the group above, but can be counseled, rehabilitated, or educated to bring themselves into some level of self-sufficiency and productivity. These folks would benefit from programs, governmental or otherwise, tasked with assisting them in the pursuit of self-sufficiency. The group tends to cause a little more of a stir between competing ideologies insofar as what is the appropriate amount of resources allocated to filling these needs and the level of accountability involved in the process, but usually there is agreement that it is worthwhile to assist this group.

Then there is the Z percent of the population; the group that causes the most consternation. While I believe this is actually two somewhat distinct sub-groups, they all fall into the same problem area: people who, by dint of circumstances and decision-making, can't seem to put it together. Maybe they ran with the wrong crowd for a time and ended up with a criminal record. Maybe their parents were substance abusers or slugs and were deprived of opportunities and any sort of decent role models. Maybe they were a teenage parent, got tossed out of the house, and just could never get things put together due to all of the associated trials and trauma. Maybe the inexorable tide of the global economy left them with bleak job prospects. Maybe they just had the worst run of luck you could possibly imagine. These are tough cases with no easy answers and you're going to hear the usual appeals from both sides...everything from what a tragedy/victim these people are to why can't they just put in the work and pull themselves up from their bootstraps?

The problems this country faces are vast. Our answer to every perceived problem is money. And our apparent preferred mechanism for action is government. It's not my problem, so in order to fix something we rely on the government to extract money from the populace to subsequently throw at the problem. The problems with this approach are evident in this very thread. Government is always pretty much the least effective and least efficient agent for obtaining results and people get angry when the money they provide to the government subsequently appears to be wasted. And even more angry when they are then required to give more.

And these problems are only going to get worse as technological change causes even more upheavals in the labor market. The value of domestic manual labor plummeted when access to the global labor markets truly opened up in the 70's. The value of global manual labor is going to similarly plummet with advances in robotics and artificial intelligence over the next 30 years. It will be convulsive to society at large and that Group Z will become even more of an issue.

The one small candle in this storm is that, despite the dire talk about income disparity these days being at an all time high (and likely getting even worse in light of the labor prognostications above), poverty in a real sense - the actual basket of goods and services consumed - is truly on its way to being eliminated. Measures of poverty by currency value are largely meaningless; rather, compare the overall health and lifestyle of someone considered to be "poor" today to that of one living 50 years ago. The difference is stark.

Thank you for the complement, but you have expounded upon what I was trying to say eloquently. Thank you for that.

 

[slappy magoo]

This is, quite literally, the only worthwhile post in this entire thread. There are certainly a dozen or so very earnest and well-intentioned posts in here as well, but they're really nothing more than self-serving blather.

The cold, depressing fact is that there will always be a low income segment of the population. But we need to break that concept out to clarify the various circumstances at play.

There will always be X percent of a population who are (due to physical or mental deficiency, injury, or untreatable behavioral issues) incapable of working or otherwise being productive or participating members of society. This group will always need to be cared for by some mechanism, either governmental or otherwise. The only real dispute most reasonable people would have about this segment is the most appropriate mechanism for which to address this population.

There will also always be Y percent of a population that have similar issues to the group above, but can be counseled, rehabilitated, or educated to bring themselves into some level of self-sufficiency and productivity. These folks would benefit from programs, governmental or otherwise, tasked with assisting them in the pursuit of self-sufficiency. The group tends to cause a little more of a stir between competing ideologies insofar as what is the appropriate amount of resources allocated to filling these needs and the level of accountability involved in the process, but usually there is agreement that it is worthwhile to assist this group.

Then there is the Z percent of the population; the group that causes the most consternation. While I believe this is actually two somewhat distinct sub-groups, they all fall into the same problem area: people who, by dint of circumstances and decision-making, can't seem to put it together. Maybe they ran with the wrong crowd for a time and ended up with a criminal record. Maybe their parents were substance abusers or slugs and were deprived of opportunities and any sort of decent role models. Maybe they were a teenage parent, got tossed out of the house, and just could never get things put together due to all of the associated trials and trauma. Maybe the inexorable tide of the global economy left them with bleak job prospects. Maybe they just had the worst run of luck you could possibly imagine. These are tough cases with no easy answers and you're going to hear the usual appeals from both sides...everything from what a tragedy/victim these people are to why can't they just put in the work and pull themselves up from their bootstraps?

The problems this country faces are vast. Our answer to every perceived problem is money. And our apparent preferred mechanism for action is government. It's not my problem, so in order to fix something we rely on the government to extract money from the populace to subsequently throw at the problem. The problems with this approach are evident in this very thread. Government is always pretty much the least effective and least efficient agent for obtaining results and people get angry when the money they provide to the government subsequently appears to be wasted. And even more angry when they are then required to give more.

And these problems are only going to get worse as technological change causes even more upheavals in the labor market. The value of domestic manual labor plummeted when access to the global labor markets truly opened up in the 70's. The value of global manual labor is going to similarly plummet with advances in robotics and artificial intelligence over the next 30 years. It will be convulsive to society at large and that Group Z will become even more of an issue.

The one small candle in this storm is that, despite the dire talk about income disparity these days being at an all time high (and likely getting even worse in light of the labor prognostications above), poverty in a real sense - the actual basket of goods and services consumed - is truly on its way to being eliminated. Measures of poverty by currency value are largely meaningless; rather, compare the overall health and lifestyle of someone considered to be "poor" today to that of one living 50 years ago. The difference is stark.

I'm sorry, what were you saying about "self serving blather" again?

 

[ChrisM]

I'm sorry, what were you saying about "self serving blather" again?

Never presume I was invoking any sort of self-exemption.

 

[slappy magoo]

Never presume I was invoking any sort of self-exemption.

Laws, no, Heaven forbid.

 

[Tom Morrow]

You missed the point. The basic gist of the story was to contrast the "magical world" vs reality. Mere miles away from the Happiest Place on Earth, people don't have a home and it's becoming a bigger issue. Maybe buck up on the reading comprehension.

But, a mere miles away from the Happiest Place on Earth, only going north instead of south, is Windermere, a very rich, fancy, privileged town. What PhotoDave said about this being a microcosm of America is correct. The articles are just using Disney World as clickbait, so you think "oh my gosh, Orlando is poverty-stricken and evil corporate Disney doesn't care!" when that is only true for some parts of it, just like every other major city in the US.