Re:Cities and Ambition (2008)
by mr_luc on Sunday January 19, 2014 @01:34PM
(#7085352)
I just wanted to chime in with observations on working poor from my own experience. Anecdotal, but maybe interesting.
I mostly agree with the root, but I want to challenge 2 things: the vulnerability to advertising, and the perceived percentage of Americans incapable of functioning in a modern world.
From 7 to 5 years ago, I tried doing manual labor, unskilled and walk-on jobs (opener/gutter on a kill floor, union carpentry and hoist operator at a prefab construction shop) for 3-4 months a year, saving my money, and living in South America the rest of the year.
I'm not sure if 'seriously underprivileged' has an exact definition, but the people I worked with: very frequently didn't graduate high school, sometimes had extensive criminal histories (one guy spent 8 years in jail for dragging what turned out to be an undercover cop behind his car), usually had a variety of addictions (ranging from the pervasive smoking and alcoholism to the 4 out of 4 of my fellow heavy equipment operators in shipping and receiving who admitted to being addicted to meth), and 30-80% of the time depending on the job, spoke no english at all.
... most also had really, really well-attuned BS detectors!
They just like different things than I liked, so they gave a free pass to products, ads and political parties they and their friends associated with. Exactly like >90% of the designers and coders I know.
The people who are being 'abused' by advertising -- let's say, by credit card companies and sneaky zero-down-payment offers and buying things they can't actually afford -- aren't necessarily being hoodwinked, but I'm sure their self-control is weakened by the experience of being poor. How could it not be?
Everyone knew a payday loan is a bad idea. Everyone knew leasing a $40,000 car when you make $25k a year is a bad idea. Everyone knew spending more of your money on booze than on rent and sustenance is a bad idea. Poorer people just tend to have a larger amount of pain in their and their families' life, with no way out visible to them, which makes self-control harder.
Now, I know there are some people who are so impaired mentally that they can't function at all in society. But I would make sure to call out and challenge the idea that 15-20% of Americans of working age can't function in modern society.
The people I worked with could function, and were functioning -- and yet it is guaranteed that a large number would fall under that '14-20% of Americans are functionally illiterate' figure.
You might say there's confirmation bias, but I was always there during hiring season, and I saw the washouts, too. There were some people -- maybe 1 in 100 of the people who started at these places, and couldn't make it and were let go -- who clearly had mental issues. I remember one guy who lived in a station wagon in the parking lot during his stint there, wore overalls with a t-shirt and no underwear, and never bathed -- the company gave him a week because they felt sorry for him, but he couldn't really function, and he ended up going back to live with his mother.
I mostly agree with the root, but I want to challenge 2 things: the vulnerability to advertising, and the perceived percentage of Americans incapable of functioning in a modern world.
From 7 to 5 years ago, I tried doing manual labor, unskilled and walk-on jobs (opener/gutter on a kill floor, union carpentry and hoist operator at a prefab construction shop) for 3-4 months a year, saving my money, and living in South America the rest of the year.
I'm not sure if 'seriously underprivileged' has an exact definition, but the people I worked with: very frequently didn't graduate high school, sometimes had extensive criminal histories (one guy spent 8 years in jail for dragging what turned out to be an undercover cop behind his car), usually had a variety of addictions (ranging from the pervasive smoking and alcoholism to the 4 out of 4 of my fellow heavy equipment operators in shipping and receiving who admitted to being addicted to meth), and 30-80% of the time depending on the job, spoke no english at all.
... most also had really, really well-attuned BS detectors!
They just like different things than I liked, so they gave a free pass to products, ads and political parties they and their friends associated with. Exactly like >90% of the designers and coders I know.
The people who are being 'abused' by advertising -- let's say, by credit card companies and sneaky zero-down-payment offers and buying things they can't actually afford -- aren't necessarily being hoodwinked, but I'm sure their self-control is weakened by the experience of being poor. How could it not be?
Everyone knew a payday loan is a bad idea. Everyone knew leasing a $40,000 car when you make $25k a year is a bad idea. Everyone knew spending more of your money on booze than on rent and sustenance is a bad idea. Poorer people just tend to have a larger amount of pain in their and their families' life, with no way out visible to them, which makes self-control harder.
Now, I know there are some people who are so impaired mentally that they can't function at all in society. But I would make sure to call out and challenge the idea that 15-20% of Americans of working age can't function in modern society.
The people I worked with could function, and were functioning -- and yet it is guaranteed that a large number would fall under that '14-20% of Americans are functionally illiterate' figure.
You might say there's confirmation bias, but I was always there during hiring season, and I saw the washouts, too. There were some people -- maybe 1 in 100 of the people who started at these places, and couldn't make it and were let go -- who clearly had mental issues. I remember one guy who lived in a station wagon in the parking lot during his stint there, wore overalls with a t-shirt and no underwear, and never bathed -- the company gave him a week because they felt sorry for him, but he couldn't really function, and he ended up going back to live with his mother.