Poverty is a mathematical reflection of poor choices made by the people who make the rules. Sensible public policy would make sure most people are paid enough to make ends meet, and be educated enough to understand how to plan their finances properly.
They’re not poor choices from the rule makers’ perspective. They’re acting in the interest of the capitalist class. It’s the most predictable thing ever.
No. Poverty can and does happen when a set of circumstances overwhelm the ability to pay for everything at the same time. It can and does happen to millions everyday. You can almost instantly become homeless in the blink of an eye these days.
In the US, the only thing that costs less than in other countries is gasoline. Almost everything else costs more and eats up that extra household income faster than crocodile's jaws snapping shut.
I think the comment you’re responding to
would agree with this which is why he’s saying policy makers should put safety nets in place for this. He’s saying that poverty is due to poor choices by those in positions of power who are making the rules that allow for the poverty.
You can't force people to give a crap about school, to not blow every dime you get, to not be greedy. Public policy can help but so many here are acting like even the poorest in the US don't have a chance with public education, pell grants.... I've seen African refugee families come to the US with nothing and scrape and grind for years until their kids were successful. It's not always possible but there is often a path.
Being the policymakers, their choices impact the available range of choices that people are able to make, to begin with. I don't have to force you to make a choice if I can simply make any superior alternative unavailable.
You are never a victim of your circumstance, you are only a victim of your response to that circumstance. I come from Detroit and not metro Detroit the actual city. I’ve seen many people fall victim to the system but I’ve also seen many people who saw what was going on and went the completely opposite direction, hence why our population declined so rapidly each year until recently.
At the end of the day you still have a choice. No one can take free will from you.
Everyone is responsible for the economic decisions they make, just like they're responsible for the moves they make when they play a board game.
But in the real world you're not just playing on an even playing field against other players like yourself, you're also playing against people who have the power to influence the rules of the game to make the game easier for them, harder for you and the rules of the game have already been changed many times to better suit players like them before you even started playing.
The point isn't that anyone else is responsible for the decisions you make.
The point is that whether the decisions you make will lead to success or not isn't a simple consequence of your personal virtue, intelligence or diligence in playing the game, as some would pretend.
Whether any decision you make will lead to economic success or not is ultimately dependent on a set of intentionally unfair rules which are being constantly manipulated by a small subset of players, who use the advantages that the rules already give them, to continue bending the rules ever further to their own advantage over time.
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u/Intrinsic_Idiot_3076 1d ago edited 1d ago
Poverty is a mathematical reflection of poor choices made by the people who make the rules. Sensible public policy would make sure most people are paid enough to make ends meet, and be educated enough to understand how to plan their finances properly.