How poverty changes your mindset

Re:How poverty changes your mindset by fastball on Monday February 26, 2018 @06:04AM (#16464494)

  "Chinese poverty is different from American poverty because we weren't worried about starving."

  Mentions a mass starvation event in China only a generation before which probably killed the equivalent of 10% of the US population at the time.

You might want to think about that a bit more.

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Re:How poverty changes your mindset by analyst74 on Monday February 26, 2018 @10:57AM (#16466191)

I specifically mentioned the famine, to bring up the contrast between the worst possible kind of poverty and how it affected people like my parents.

Of course, I only see residue effects long after it happened, so maybe time does heal all wounds.

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Re:How poverty changes your mindset by fastball on Monday February 26, 2018 @11:23AM (#16466417)

Or maybe your generation had it easier because there was less competition?

8.1% of China's population is still malnourished to the point of stunting[1].

It's only 2.1% in the US.

1. https://data.unicef.org/topic/nutrition/malnutrition/

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Re:How poverty changes your mindset by bildung on Monday February 26, 2018 @07:53AM (#16464912)

Famines were sadly very common in China: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_famines_in_China

People often comment on the 1958 famine as some singular event, but it actually was the 6th and last in the 20th century.

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Re:How poverty changes your mindset by fastball on Monday February 26, 2018 @08:45AM (#16465171)

I can't tell if you're agreeing with me? Because yes, I'm aware of that. That is why I am so confused by OP seeming to say "in China we don't have to worry about starvation even when we're poor".

It's just so far from true I don't understand why they are getting upvoted (and me downvoted).

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Re:How poverty changes your mindset by fencepost on Monday February 26, 2018 @10:01AM (#16465720)

My take would be that they weren't starving because they were poor, they were starving because there was no food to be had. Starvation in a famine is different from starvation in a land of plenty where you simply can't afford food.

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Re:How poverty changes your mindset by fastball on Monday February 26, 2018 @11:06AM (#16466271)

If there was no food, the entire population of China would've died.

In the case of a famine, it's still the haves and the have-nots.

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Re:How poverty changes your mindset by simonh on Monday February 26, 2018 @11:18AM (#16466357)

At the time the poster was growing up, starvation wasn't a concern. My wife grew up around the same time, she was born in 1975. There had been a famine a generation before, but that wasn't an issue she had to worry about. What happened a generation before does not invalidate that reported experience and isn't relevant to it.

Even now, people in China are not concerned with or at risk of famine. It doesn't matter how many famines there were 50+ years ago, it won't make that untrue unless you can point to a credible reason why Chinese people today should fear famine.

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Re:How poverty changes your mindset by noselasd on Monday February 26, 2018 @09:37AM (#16465532)

Probably the commenter was born after 1962.

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Re:How poverty changes your mindset by fastball on Monday February 26, 2018 @11:19AM (#16466376)

Seems like it. Doesn't really matter though.

The most recent UNICEF data[1] puts malnutrition to the point of stunting at 8.1% in China.

In the US it was 2.1%.

1. https://data.unicef.org/topic/nutrition/malnutrition/

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