If only everyone had the money and time to actually make that choice. If you are living paycheck to paycheck, that means you can't afford to move without going into more debt. Moving costs money, even just moving across town. I'm usually out a good 1-2k when I move apartments just in my town after all application fees and deposits have been paid. My last landlord was a management corporation that figured out a way to whittle down my $1800 security deposit from my last apartment to $38 from things like "scratched floors" and "dents," so the deposit is rarely that. If I was broke, moving would be impossible.
If you are broke you are gonna have an impossible time lining up work wherever you are going. No low skilled place is going to hire an out of area candidate when there are local applicants. You will have to show up from say, expensive south central LA to 'cheaper' boise, having spent hundreds of dollars in gas along the way, and now need to put money down on a security deposit. Since your credit is probably bad since you are broke, you will probably have to pay a huge deposit. My very first apartment when I had no credit asked for three months of rent as a deposit. If you are broke you don't have money for gas or these deposits, and will have had to go into debt. So now you are in a new area where you no absolutely no one, with no job, thousands in debt. You might spend the rest of your working life trying to get out of the hole you just dug for yourself, and that's assuming you don't get sick along the way.
It's no wonder why so many people are homeless, and why most of the working poor in cities like LA live in overcrowded apartments rather than "going elsewhere" like wisecrack comments on the internet seem to suggest they do. I don't think people on this board have any concept of how expensive it is to be poor in this country, and this comment is case in point.
If you are broke you are gonna have an impossible time lining up work wherever you are going. No low skilled place is going to hire an out of area candidate when there are local applicants. You will have to show up from say, expensive south central LA to 'cheaper' boise, having spent hundreds of dollars in gas along the way, and now need to put money down on a security deposit. Since your credit is probably bad since you are broke, you will probably have to pay a huge deposit. My very first apartment when I had no credit asked for three months of rent as a deposit. If you are broke you don't have money for gas or these deposits, and will have had to go into debt. So now you are in a new area where you no absolutely no one, with no job, thousands in debt. You might spend the rest of your working life trying to get out of the hole you just dug for yourself, and that's assuming you don't get sick along the way.
It's no wonder why so many people are homeless, and why most of the working poor in cities like LA live in overcrowded apartments rather than "going elsewhere" like wisecrack comments on the internet seem to suggest they do. I don't think people on this board have any concept of how expensive it is to be poor in this country, and this comment is case in point.