Laziness isn’t why people are poor. And iPhones aren’t why they lack health care

https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2017/03/08/laziness-isnt-why-people-are-poor-and-iphones-arent-why-they-lack-health-care/

by paulpauper • 9 years ago

145 206 9 years ago

washingtonpost.com

VonGuard• 9 years ago

For years, my father would say "that guy using the food bank has an iPhone! I don't have an iPhone, and I'm not poor. How can these people afford iPhones?"

It's a generational thing, especially. iPhones are seen as glamorous luxury items, not as an essential tool for living. I always remind my father that the people who have little money but also have iPhones likely don't have a home phone number, home computer, or Internet service in their house. Their iPhone is their only connection to the modern digital world: The one asset they have to get themselves a job, assistance, information. It's arguably one of the most important items for a person to own, today, right up there with a car. Without a good phone and a car, people in the US are basically beached on a shore of unemployment, or low employment, especially in rural towns.

It's incredibly hard for people to get back on the horse when they've fallen off, economically. Even harder if they never had a horse to begin with. At the local library, people are constantly coming in to ask for help with digital literacy problems that affect their lives heavily: paying bills, responding to emails, seeing pictures of their grandchildren that were sent to their email. Having a phone with Internet is literally an essential part of modern life, and the generation that thinks poor people shouldn't have iPhones are the same ones who generally view all this technology stuff as magical hoo hah. Like my dad...

Banthum8• 9 years ago

iPhones are luxury smartphones.

There are other smartphones that fulfill the same purposes (that you outlined above) which are much cheaper.

If someone in poverty buys an iPhone instead of a budget alternative, it's an indicator that they lack a basic ability to evaluate a handful of economic choices and choose the most appropriate (and thrifty) one. It's the smartphone equivalent of getting chrome rims on your car wheels.

EDIT: I was disappointed but not surprised that the article didn't even acknowledge this fact, nor really make a case at all for what it was saying. I couldn't find any attempt to convince at all in what was written; it was simply a declaration of how right the author's view is and how obviously stupidly wrong the concept of someone being responsible for their own outcomes is.

kevingadd5• 9 years ago

At various points of time you've been able to get a new (not used) iPhone for $99. Cut the bullshit.

You can get an Android phone for cheaper than an iPhone, but you pay for it in lost time (not to mention the low quality of budget Android phones)

iPhones are iPhones. There are luxury priced ones, of course, and they were never 'budget', but having access to the internet isn't a luxury anymore. It's a requirement.

macintux4• 9 years ago

Yet you can pick up an iPhone 5s for less than $200 off-contract at Walmart.

So, no, your argument fails to hold water. Maybe their circle also uses iPhones. Maybe they want robust hardware and software for a device that will help determine whether they get and keep a job, and rightly or wrongly they feel an iPhone provides that robustness.

davexunit5• 9 years ago

This is a pretty ignorant comment. Not surprised to see this libertarian, blame the poor for being poor, mindset here on HN.

oxide3• 9 years ago

It's the smartphone equivalent of getting chrome rims on your car wheels.

which people in poverty do all the time. even on shitty cars.

what is your point?

M_Grey19• 9 years ago

You make it sound like "iPhone" must mean "Brand new, cutting edge iPhone!" It could also be... old, refurbished, or "The iPhone I won" or "the iPhone I got on the best sale, " or "The iPhone I still have from when I had a home, and stuff. It's my connection to the world so I can't sell it off."

It isn't just a failure of empathy, but creativity, to miss these points.

brookside4• 9 years ago

Came here to say this. An argument could be made several years ago that an iPhone was a savvy purchase as they truely worked significantly both better and for longer, than the competition.

Now it is quite possible to get a quality smartphone for $200 ( http://thewirecutter.com/reviews/best-budget-android-phone/ ) instead of almost 1k.

Agree to grandparent's points about smartphones being almost indispensable tools for those without computers and landlines.

netfire• 9 years ago

I'll add that the article doesn't seem to add the monthly cell phone costs (minutes, text and data -- especially data) into their calculation. Dependending on how much data you are using, that could be significant. Also, I imagine most phone are bought using installment plans, which increases the monthly costs, and makes it hard to save and make better investments in your future. (What you think you can afford today, may not be what you can afford tomorrow).

eganist2• 9 years ago

iPhones are luxury smartphones.

Used iPhones and year-old iPhones (likewise for Galaxy S-model phones and others on the top end) still perform better than "mid-tier" phones. Given this, an iPhone and "a budget alternative" are not mutually exclusive terms. Keep in mind that for most people today, a phone might well be the closest they can get to having any form of decent connectivity, so it becomes an investment in one's future to buy a device with years of life ahead of it.

A _new_ iPhone might be mutually exclusive with "a budget alternative," but that's not what's being argued.

CydeWeys2• 9 years ago

The article addresses this exact form of argument in a manner that I find compelling:

There’s one final problem with these kinds of arguments, and that is the implication that we should be worried by the possibility of poor people buying the occasional steak, lottery ticket or, yes, even an iPhone. Set aside the fact that a better cut of meat may be more nutritious than a meal Chaffetz would approve of, or the fact that a smartphone may be your only access to email, job notices, benefit applications, school work and so on. Why do we begrudge people struggling to get by the occasional indulgence? Why do we so little value pleasure and joy? Why do we insist that if you are poor, you should also be miserable? Why do we require penitence?

xyzzy123• 9 years ago

Where I live, rent starts at 24 top of the line iphones a year for a family.

seppin4• 9 years ago

An iphone 3 or 4 is less than most androids

pixelbill• 9 years ago

Are you serious with this? You are just as clueless as these idiot politicians.

More often than not people are NOT responsible for their outcome. It is a genetic lottery. Will you be born into money? Then you're set for life. Not born into money? You're going to struggle and have to work much harder just to survive, let alone get ahead. That's unlikely to happen.

So a big old FRAK YOU to the arrogant assholes who claim poor people just need to work harder and be smarter, when I promise you they work much harder than yourself. Friends with that piece of human garbage Jason Chaffetz? He tells people they need to stop wasting their money (that they don't have) while he gets everything in his entire life paid for by rich donors who control his vote. Fuck. You.

spinchange• 9 years ago

it's an indicator that they lack a basic ability to evaluate a handful of economic choices and choose the most appropriate (and thrifty) one. It's the smartphone equivalent of getting chrome rims on your car wheels.

You act like an iPhone is a Rolls Royce to an Android being like a Kia. It's absolutely not that materially different in cost, and most decent Android devices worth their salt cost as much, or almost as much as an iPhone. Nearly all of these device (irrespective of platform) are bought on time/installments as part of one's monthly bill anyway! Another thing to consider is that if someone of limited means needed a device and was trying to buy a cheaper unlocked Android, that actually might be harder for their cash flow since the monthly installment plans are lower and easier to manage from a cash flow standpoint than dropping $200-$300 at once for a more economical (but already inferior!) model. These seem like small trivial things, but they're the kinds of decisions people need to make, and again a lot of pople have to have some kind of net/web connected device for more than leisure.

Ultimately, it just does not follow to me that people who need a decent and reliable smart phone in 2017 would have better healthcare outcomes if only they skipped having one, or bought a flip phone or even an Android phone instead of an iPhone. Medical procedures run into the thousands or tens of thousands. Premiums on family medical coverage are like 2 iPhones _per month_, so getting that less robust model device really isn't going to make much difference and it may not last as long, costing more in the end, anyway.

FWIW, I use an Android device, I just don't think iPhones are the culprit or an automatic indicator that the person of limited means using one is irresponsible or incapable of making good financial decisions. That seem like a harsh judgment.

dabbledash• 9 years ago

I think this is based on a misunderstanding of the kind of "economic choices" a person with little or no income will face. If a person can't afford to pay for housing or food, it's probably not because they're blowing lots of cash on phones. If you buy a $100 smartphone instead of a new iPhone, you'll save maybe $650 over a period of years, which won't cover even a month of expenses in most cities.

For many middle class and upper middle class people, being financially responsible is a matter of being thrifty with the adequate resources they have; for a person who is truly poor the issue is more likely to be a straight up lack of income, and no amount of pinching pennies is going to result in enough money to pay rent.

judah2• 9 years ago

Not just the poor, but even homeless often have phones.

I'm the author of YSN[0], which is a web and mobile app for helping homeless youth in Minnesota.

Whenever I show the app to people, the usual response is: "Wait, homeless youth have phones?"

The answer is yes, a great many do. Because, as you note, it's their only connection to the digital world, and often times, the only connection to friends or family.

[0] https://ysnmn.org

jacquesm7• 9 years ago

For a homeless person a phone is a first degree necessity.

lacampbell4• 9 years ago

It's a generational thing, especially. iPhones are seen as glamorous luxury items, not as an essential tool for living.

What planet do you live on?

An iphone is not an essential tool for living. I was without a smartphone while I was looking for a job last year, and used an old monochrome cellular device. I managed to keep on living without much difficulty. And yes - I travelled.

An iphone is a flagship smartphone, there are much cheaper devices you can use to browse the net.

andrewekeren• 9 years ago

It takes a technical person to know there are alternatives.

wutbrodo2• 9 years ago

I obviously think that Chaffetz's comment was roughly as idiotic as you'd expect from Jason Chaffetz (the high end of Healthcare costs are so exorbitant that any common luxury purchase you can think of completely pales in comparison).

But your comment conflates "one of the most expensive smartphones" with "having any connection to the digital world". No disagreement that connectivity is critical and that mobile devices are an efficient way to get there on a low income, but iPhones are definitely not. My mom doesn't have a working computer in her house atm, and her phone cost 200 dollars (or free with carrier subsidy). There's pretty much no reason to get an iPhone on purely functional grounds, just as there would be no reason to get a $700 Galaxy S7.

Though I should note that ios has moved downmarket when they started selling older models, which filled some of this gap.

kevingadd5• 9 years ago

Try giving a $50 android phone to your grandma (or your mother, for that matter) and see how many complaints and questions you get.

I gave up on giving Android devices to my family. They always replaced them with iPhones (used, typically).

jacquesm7• 9 years ago

A second hand iphone would do just fine and would be cheap. 'Iphone' does not magically translate into $700 piece of hardware, it could easily be $50 or $100 when bought second hand or even free when a gift from a family member or even a stranger. Heck I know of some iPhones that have gone through 4 pairs of hands by now. Just because the first owner moves on to a newer and shinier model whenever they come out (talk about bad decisions...).

_23sd4• 9 years ago

People with little internet access don't have the tools to properly comparison shop, they're going to walk into an AT&T or Boost store and probably leave with what the salesperson is able to push on them. iPhones have always been available for around $200 with carrier subsidies, if I'm not forgetting an early period when it cost more.

Then there's the issue of older people using the term "iPhone" generically. Poor people overwhelmingly have Android phones (as evidenced by the massive disparity between the perceived iPhone market share in the tech bubble and reality), but it's all the same to Republicans.

boona• 9 years ago

I obviously think that Chaffetz's comment was roughly as idiotic as you'd expect from Jason Chaffetz

And that time Obama made a similar argument, you thought he was just as idiotic as well right?

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2017/03/07/chaffetz-hit-for-...

michaelmrose5• 9 years ago

A few data points.

People become poor after buying stuff like iphones and often wouldn't improve their financial position by selling them.

People get expensive phones for cheap with contracts. If the problem is that family needs 400 per month in food stamps and 700 help affording health insurance which amounts to 13000 a year in help the extra 200 they paid for an iphone is a small thing.

People buy older phones for cheap or even get given them by family members who upgrade. I can buy an older iphone on craigslist for $40 right now.

mikestew• 9 years ago

and the generation that thinks poor people shouldn't have iPhones are the same ones who generally view all this technology stuff as magical hoo hah.

Which means they are unlikely to accurately identify an actual iPhone. More likely, they see a glass surface on a diagonally 5" device, and just assume the $50 low-end Android phone is an iPhone. That, and it conveniently fits their uncharitable mind set.

killwhitey• 9 years ago

I own a 4 year old Nexus 4 that I got for $200. Almost everyone I encounter thinks it's an iPhone initially. Many people (especially the older ones) still think it's an iPhone after I tell them it isn't.

dllthomas• 9 years ago

Without a good phone and a car

There are a lot of things that can go into "good" - unpacking, I think here you more specifically mean "(sufficiently) reliable"?

norea-armozel• 9 years ago

Remember, these are the kind of people that conflate wealth with owning even a used refrigerator. Or having a used car or anything else that's a modern staple of industrial societies. It's all about the idea that poorness is a sign of sinfulness. And that the righteous are magically immune to the misfortunes of the corrupted material world. Essentially, it's a heretical belief that so many Christian Americans love to entertain even if they verbally denounce it. I really wish more Christians would denounce such heresy to the point of shunning even politicians from their congregations. Maybe then we'd see this nonsense dropped for good.

emjoes1• 9 years ago

From what I have observed low income people have ObamaPhones. So perhaps that is how they are affording them. But then again the people I observed lived in a ghetto and were signing up for cable and seemed to have more disposable income than they let on... A bit like your father I am confused how they afford a bunch of stuff they appeared to own.

Balgair• 9 years ago

Wow, you are the only commentator in this thread to mention the ObamaPhone; I guess most HN readers here don't interact with less well off society. I know a fair few people that have one and love them. The program, from my anecdata, really does help out the less well off get a job, find information and opportunities, and generally interact with the larger world. Yes, some are just wackos and lazy, but from my view of the world, the taxes that are used via Obamaphones are very out weighed by the increased taxes from when people get stable jobs through the program. If the world is becoming increasingly automated, networked, wired, whatever, then a smartphone is the 0th step in getting people at least up to date with today's zeitgeist.

http://www.obamaphone.com/what-is-the-obama-phone

stagbeetle5• 9 years ago

Last I saw, ObamaPhones were not smartphones under any definition.

They resemble old Nokias (although I've seen flip phones).

adewinter• 9 years ago

The worst part is it doesn't even matter if it's an 'essential tool for living' or not. People who say stuff like your father have obviously never been the crippling, soul destroying, kind of poor.

When your life is filled with stress (because you have to work two jobs) and you are constantly on the verge of being homeless/going hungry (despite working 50-80 hours a week), the choice is simple. Choosing between some brief happiness and luxury given by an iPhone, satellite TV, tasty junk food,a nice pair of sneakers, or even a hit of heroin versus more AGONY, STRESS and PAIN provided by real life is a no brainer.

It's hard to fault someone for choosing to take a slice of happiness for themselves in between long stretches of crappy existence. Is it not obvious that one should think twice about judging someone else's motivation and behavior without context? What do you know about their life and why they do the things they do?

There is even related research that has repeatedly demonstrated[1] that being poor is /not/ due to laziness or being a lesser human. When poor/disadvantaged people are provided funds (with no strings attached!) they do the right thing and improve their own lives. They don't just "spend it all" on "booze and drugs". With the money their lives improve significantly and permanently.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unconditional_cash_transfer , https://www.forbes.com/sites/kerryadolan/2013/05/28/why-goog... , etc

vilmosi14• 9 years ago

You're conflating an iPhone with a smartphone...

js8• 9 years ago

I agree. My grandmother used to complain in a similar manner, except it was about TV. See, here in Czech Republic, during communism, things like rents and utilities were cheap, but TVs (especially color ones) were a luxury item. Now anybody can have a TV, but the poor people actually spend most money on rent and utilities (we fortunately don't have such a big health care problem as in the U.S.). But I also recently realized she was wrong, because she had wrong "pattern" of status imprinted in memory.

dvtv753• 9 years ago

One of the things that irks me about this is the number of people who would pull a gun on me and insist they're free to live their lives the way they want, do whatever they like, but the moment there's a poor person with a TV then that person is scum and lazy and should be forced - possibly even at gunpoint - to give up any positives in their lives, and live according to the standards set by the person who just insisted that nobody can tell them how to live.

It particularly irritates me when it's a some shady employer who refuses to pay for the work done, or demands absolute devotion and loyalty for the barest minimum they can bear to part with.

dvtv753• 9 years ago

Along these lines, a while ago I was fortunate enough to come into (indirect) contact with an organization that was retiring a bunch of old Apple systems and a few PCs. Because of this, a number of people too poor to consider buying a computer have one. One larger family has two. One small family has three, but it allows the father to work from home, rather than working another 70 hours at work (for no extra pay).

I'm sure that a number of the people in this thread, on seeing these computers in these homes, would immediately jump to the conclusion that these poor people are undeserving of any kindness or welfare because they wasted their money on shiny computers - an attitude often proudly worn on the sleeve. I've heard the satellite dish argument before, which makes the very same assumption. ("I was in a poor area and I saw satellite dishes on most houses!" What percentage of houses? Why assume they were hooked up? Why assume that in every house is a poor family? At what threshold would you allow people to start spending their own money as they see fit, and what if there's no way they can earn enough to reach this threshold? Who died and made you dictator of the world, anyway?)

Funny thing is that while some small number know who I am, and some think I'm awesome for giving them a computer, I'm not. All I am is the middleman. It's the organization doing the upgrading who got the computers to me that's the real star here. I just happened to know some people in need - and I'm quite excited because the organization may be retiring a few more computers in the near future.

We might be able to help change a few more lives for the better. I will have to start looking for more struggling families.

revscat2• 9 years ago

No, but wealthy libertarians with vast amounts of political power believe it. According to adherents of this belief system, poverty is a symptom of laziness, full stop, and government can do nothing, and more importantly must not.

M_Grey19• 9 years ago

I doubt that they believe it, as much as they see it as a convenient philosophy to propagate. It really is the philosophy of the exceedingly short-sighted, arrogant, or just plain uneducated. You can't have even a passing knowledge of history and think that philosophy has merit. You could very easily think it has merit as a cultural sword and shield though.

It's ironic that the people with the resources and power to rapidly alter the self-destructive course humanity is on, are the most invested in maintaining that course.

Banthum8• 9 years ago

You think the idea that people are generally responsible for their own outcomes is "exceedingly short-sighted, arrogant, or just plain uneducated"?

didgeoridoo3• 9 years ago

Your and GP's inability to articulate libertarian philosophy does not constitute a reasoned critique of said philosophy. If you want people to be convinced, learn the actual arguments of the other side, and explain why you disagree.

M_Grey19• 9 years ago

The essential problem is that most people can't accumulate, synthesize, and understand the requisite knowledge to appreciate that fact. We're strongly limited by our perspectives, which tend to become more rigid with time, just as we're having maximal influence on the lives of others. We're tribal, we're competitive, and we find it difficult to relate to distant strangers in vast numbers.

As a result people eschew the attempt to gain a broad view of the world, and its history, and instead decide to trust an ideologue, ideology, religion, or just as likely these days, invent their own bullshit and find others with similar flavors of crap. "Oh you think the universe is crystals and orgone? Me too!" "Oh you think that black people smell funny? Me too!" "Oh you think the moon is an illusion created by God?..."

You get. At the top you have people with enough money and time, power and education to appreciate these factors. Most of them seem to be in it largely for themselves, and even those who later come to some kind of humanitarian spirit do so in a fractional way compared to their total wealth. Exceptions exist, but they are so rare we all know the names.

Is it any wonder that in a world of such massively "Haves" and brutally "Have-Nots", that each group invents a largely specious narrative to explain the actions of the other?

Romanulus• 9 years ago

Huh. Colour me controversial, but I always thought it had to do with low IQ, traumatic childhoods, and not being able to defer gratification, etc.

M_Grey19• 9 years ago

That's not controversial at all, about half of the country seems to believe that. It's just... wrong.

synicalx• 9 years ago

Is it entirely wrong though? Dumb people who impulse buy things aren't poor?

Tepix2• 9 years ago

Not controversial, just uninformed.

Being poor can lower your IQ. Read this http://theweek.com/articles/460396/how-being-poor-lower-iq

jonbarker• 9 years ago

America is the land of opportunity; rich people in America took advantage of the opportunity. Therefore taking advantage of this opportunity can make you rich. Says nothing about the arguments for the causes of poverty. Also valid modus ponens but unsound. Also potentially suffering from Hume's "problem with induction".

AstralStorm8• 9 years ago

Opportunity makes opportunity.

As it is now, many low key opportunities have been taken and/or removed, it is now much harder than ever to break through for an enterprising person - need much more up front investment.

In the past, you could indeed go from a paperboy to a writer. Try doing it today.

shas33• 9 years ago

Going against the grain, I don't think Chaffetz meant it literally.

While he may or may not have been taking an extremist Right ideological view of poverty, the OP article takes another extreme ideological view, that poverty is inevitable and individuals can do little to avoid it.

While it sounds heartless, I think there is some truth to the assertion that sound financial choices can lift you up from poverty. Duflo, Banerjee, etc. from the randomista economists crowd have shown that poor people are sometimes likely to spend extra cash in suboptimal ways (TV ownership when they need extra calories, etc.). http://economics.mit.edu/files/530

This includes buying health insurance. That health insurance is too expensive is unfortunate, and I think GOP earnestly believes that their plan makes it cheaper for people to buy health insurance. This is not unlike how Obama and Democrats implemented their healthcare overhaul with the best of intentions, yet it lead to expensive premiums, etc.

While we are loathe to admit it, poverty is a result of both poor choices and unavoidable bad-luck. Like the common debate of 'nature vs. nurture', it is hard to delineate bad-luck and poor-choices as causes leading to poverty.

At the end of the day, we should have compassion and understand that many things that affect our situation are beyond our control, and yet not be afraid to consider honestly and objectively, the various causes of poverty.

seppin4• 9 years ago

At the end of the day, we should have compassion and understand that many things that affect our situation are beyond our control, and yet not be afraid to consider honestly and objectively, the various causes of poverty.

Do you let people die on the street, no matter what got them there, or not? It's a simple question.

shas33• 9 years ago

You wouldn't if you had compassion. Holding compassion and objectivity in your head simultaneously would enable you to both help the person and acknowledge that the person may have made poor choices and decisions to get them to where they are. If you ignore that people make poor choices, you are doing a disservice to the poor, since you won't then be able to address this cause/aspect of poverty.

Tepix2• 9 years ago

I guess you missed the part of the article where it explained that the largest group of poor people are children. Do you think they made poor financial choices?

And you also missed "Rates of intergenerational income mobility are, in fact, higher in France, Spain, Germany, Canada, Japan, New Zealand and other countries in the world than they are here in the United States."

Governments can do a lot to help people get out of poverty. Blaming them isn't one of them.

shas33• 9 years ago

I guess you missed the part of the article where it explained that the largest group of poor people are children. Do you think they made poor financial choices? And you also missed "Rates of intergenerational income mobility are, in fact, higher in France, Spain, Germany, Canada, Japan, New Zealand and other countries in the world than they are here in the United States."

Are you suggesting that I am not acknowledging bad-luck (the sole reason for childhood poverty) as a factor? Because, I do.

As to Germany, Japan, etc. there are many reasons why those countries are better off. "Germany does this, their poverty is lower, so America should do this," isn't a valid argument for anything.

Blaming them isn't one of them.

Blaming them (i.e. chiding them) doesn't serve any purpose. But helping them modify behavior, educating them, etc. does. The Government should acknowledge this.

AbrahamParangi• 9 years ago

I agree with your final point and the general assertion that situations can drive behavior just as behavior can drive situations- but I think giving Chaffetz credit for a more reasonable point of view than expressed is unwarranted.

Even if you (very reasonably) want to resist demonizing folks who disagree with you, it's important to not overcorrect.

"The best lack all conviction, while the worst are full of passionate intensity"

wiredone• 9 years ago

I think you might find this interesting:

http://www.radiolab.org/story/radiolab-presents-media-busted...

A few logical fallacies to your point:

- People without healthcare are charged more for healthcare as they are unable to negotiate bulk rates for care and medication.

- The system is setup in a way that people who live day-to-day are unable to respond to life-events such as a car accident or a death of a income generating family member. They live hanging by a thread.

- It costs more to be a poor person. You can't buy things in bulk or pay by the quarter/year for things at a discount.

- poor people eat less-healthily, and have less free time to excercise. This leads to poorly health outcomes (the aggregate stats don't lie).

- "poor decisions" often come from education. poor people live in neighborhoods where their ability to learn other life skills but surviving is limited a(critical thinking, long term planning etc) and the public education on offer leads to poorer outcomes.

maxerickson• 9 years ago

Yes, discarding standardization will make plans with lower premiums available.

Massively cutting the subsidies people have been getting won't make plans any more affordable, at least not in the short to medium term.

Wanting to reduce government spending is an ideologically coherent position to take. Trying to sell it as fixing the healthcare system is awful.

smhenderson• 9 years ago

And there is just no room in your view that there is systemic racism in this country that precludes some people from "making it" in America? And that beyond racism that the economic system in America is basically geared toward those who have a lot of wealth collecting more and those that don't basically staying put in the bracket they are currently in?

I'm not saying there are not exceptions. Poor minorities make out of the neighborhood they grew up in sometimes. Middle class people get lucky and get rich, I'm sure both of these happen everyday in a large population like ours.

But I believe these occurrences to be the exceptions not the rule and that for a large majority of Americans in our time working hard and making perfect decisions isn't an automatic ticket to success and wealth.

mnm1• 9 years ago

So he didn't mean it literally, just meant to insult the poor and shirk his own party's responsibility for providing healthcare to people (especially children) that can't afford it out of no fault of their own. But hey, if you're making $20k a year, you should be able to throw down $10-$15k a year on health insurance with no problem, right? Conservative math is amazing!

oculusthrift2• 9 years ago

one thing I haven't heard mentioned is that a lot of poor people DON'T have iPhones. they have cheap flip phones with prepaid cards. And guess what? They still can't afford health care.

ceejayoz7• 9 years ago

It's yet another sign that they have no clue about how much healthcare actually costs (likely having had employer-subsidized coverage before their cushy Congressional coverage).

I'm on the exchanges, and my family of four pays $2,001/month plus a $4k max out-of-pocket (that we're guaranteed to hit). That's about three iPhones a month.

judah2• 9 years ago

I work with the poor often, and I think this article is off a bit.

I work with a group of homeless shelters in my job, and my local religious congregation regularly volunteers at homeless shelters, food shelves, multiple times a month. And one thing I've found is that while many poor aren't lazy, some most certainly are. Some people don't want to work.

Here's one example. A man whom I've never met contacted me through my congregation. He said he had no money for groceries. We met him a few times and sure enough, he was unemployed and living bare minimum on welfare. So we helped this guy. I bought him groceries every week for a few months. All the while, we tried to help him get a job so that he could stand on his own feet.

But what we found is that this particular man always found excuses not to take a job. It didn't make enough money, it wasn't what I wanted to do, etc.

Eventually, we saw he was merely using our limited resources to live and eat for free.

When you're living on the charity of others (or the government), it's wrong to be picky and choosy about employment.

Bottom line: While not all poor are lazy, I'm absolutely convinced that some poor are poor because they don't want to work. Some are more comfortable living off the charity of others. And I wish this weren't the case.

Banthum8• 9 years ago

Thank you very much for adding some useful experience here.

Obviously there are poor who really don't want to be.

And there are some who really do just refuse to do the basic things one needs to do to not be poor.

Too many people act like one of these groups can't possibly exist. So many people seem to think it's evil or unthinkable to even suggest what you're saying is real to any degree.

It's really just a question of how many.

Considering how well some refugee groups (e.g. Viet boat people) have done starting from absolutely nothing in America, I'm willing to believe there is a path up for people willing to take the basic actions required to climb it.

AstralStorm8• 9 years ago

The path is getting narrower every day with low skill jobs being centralised and automated away.

barrkel• 9 years ago

If people woke up to how unearned things like intelligence and circumstances of birth are, and how much they affect life outcomes, they'd be beset with guilt. Thus it's psychologically imperative that they can blame some other factor for poor people. They'll pick out one thing, and load it up with all the meaning.

What particularly disgusts me is judging people for their choice of resource allocation, for using their very freedom. If a poor person chooses to invest in a high-end phone, it's probably because they really really want it; because it will transform their lives more than can easily be appreciated on the outside. It's the same thing with a luxury meal; being poor doesn't mean you ought to live on water and gruel for the whole of your life with the aim of saving a small bundle of cash in case of illness - such a life would hardly be worth living. Flourishing demands peaks, local maxima of happiness, and to deny poor people that is almost inhuman.

AstralStorm8• 9 years ago

I'd add that this extreme would make them essentially less well off than ancient slaves most of the time...

"Sure, we banned slavery, but instead you get to live in the same conditions!"

peterwwillis3• 9 years ago

I think the reason people here don't have health care is we don't require and provide it, and we make it more expensive than any other country.

60 countries have universal health care. Some have a basic national requirement that all insurance companies are required to cover everyone with no exceptions, and that for the most basic health insurance they are not allowed to make a profit, but can offer supplemental plans. Some countries have a dual models of both state and private insurance providers. Some make non-elder care private and compulsory while elder care is provided by taxation. Some require co-pays, some are free. Some are centralized, some decentralized.

What is clear is that in the majority of modernized countries around the world, they figured out how to do universal healthcare a long time ago, and here we are looking like fucking country bumpkins who can't figure out how to give people a basic public service. One of our many national embarrassments.

elonimus• 9 years ago

To the arguments focused around "An iphone is a flagship smartphone", please consider the highly driven narrative of thus..."the iPhone is the only smartphone". I realise this perspective may appear delusional, but in reality we enforce immensely strong ideologies...with our silly marketing budgets... yet we are unable to relate with the precariat all that we have affected...When we elect a president like this it's, honestly, time for a thoroughly investigated reality check.

_23sd4• 9 years ago

Even if it was true that the cost of iPhones and other minor indulgences could buy a year's worth of quality health insurance (as mentioned in the article, it's not even close), I'd still have a hard time seeing the Republican side. My past flirtations with right-libertarianism make it hard to cringe at the idea that society doesn't have to save people from making bad choices, but it's not that simple and the Republicans obviously know it. They're trying to stop a budget review of the Obamacare repeal because they know that the government, hospitals, people paying insurance premiums, and so on, will see a sudden increase in the financial burden they bear for ER treatment of people who lack health insurance (not to mention the wider public health implications and the complicated cost calculations on that). That's what Obamacare was really about, and by some standards it was very effective at addressing the issue. Once again, Republican voters shoot themselves in the foot by cheering for the poor to suffer.

Laziness isn’t why people are poor. And iPhones aren’t why they lack health care

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