[eatsyourtacos]

Except the definitions of poverty are defined to make it seems like it's not poverty. When you have a massive amount of the population that lives paycheck to paycheck, is one small medical emergency away from bankruptcy / can't pay their rent/mortgage. Will lose their job because of little to no protections. Very little social safety nets... most people are a lot closer to 'poverty' than looking at simple statistics.

[illusive4080]

The definitions of poverty are used to measure relative wealth, not whether someone lives paycheck to paycheck. As income increases, paycheck to paycheck reports decrease, but at a certain point it then increases again. Living paycheck to paycheck is a poor measure, because you can buy a house that’s too expensive for your income, or a car, eat out too much, or make a variety of other poor life choices. That’s why the poverty index is good at measuring relative decreases in poverty because it ignores poor life choices.

[slibhb]

Living paycheck to paycheck is usually a choice: people earn a lot of money and spend it immediately. The fact that this leaves them vulnerable to misfortune doesn't mean they're poor.

[aaarrm]

While this can be true, this absolutely is not true for the majority of paycheck-to-paycheck people. You truly need to get your head out of your ass if you honestly believe this is what is causing people to be poor.

[panick21_]

With the insane rates of consumtion, home ownership and car ownership, it simply is a fact. Tons of people live paycheck to paycheck and call themsevles poor, when they have an 80k truck with monthly payment as high as some peoples rent. And often credit card debt with monthly payments as well.

Yes, sometimes this is medical debt or other unavoidable things. But its also true that the consumtion rate is incredibly high and the savings rate is incredibly low, with US credit card industry making it easy to create huge debts.

So its simply a fact that a huge amount of people live in self imposed risky situations. Instead of an emergency fund, they think they can just open a new credit card.

So its of course not what is causing people to be poor, but what is does is that it makes many, many more people 'living on the edge' then there should be based on their actual incomes.

[slibhb]

The poverty rate in the US is ~10% and the percentage of workers who live paycheck-to-paycheck is ~35%. So it is true for the majority of people living paycheck-to-paycheck.

[illusive4080]

Do you know any of those people? Yes it’s almost entirely a choice. Typically a combination of poor life choices in tandem with poor financial choices.

[lymbo]

Which coastal major city do you live in?

[illusive4080]

You couldn’t be more wrong about who I am. My relatives and friends are some who have made those poor choices, and neither them nor I live in a major city. The poor in America are in two major camps: inner city and rural America. Both have different reasons for economic poverty and both stem from poor choices.

[eatsyourtacos]

Give me a break. Most people don't have any real benefits. Healthcare costs are insane. Daycare costs are insane. Rent is insane. Car costs are insane. Insurance is insane. Grocery costs are insane. Higher education costs are insane.

You sound like you are single no kids and on here with a cushy tech job and be like "those poor people just don't know how to manage their money!"

[slibhb]

Purchasing power is up modestly over the past 25 years. This idea that everyone is struggling/poor just isn't true (though some people certainly are).

[panick21_]

Grocery costs are not actually that insane. Plenty of people have demonstrated that you can live a healthy diet for a 300$ a month, with some people doing it for much less.

Car costs don't have to be insane. If you are smart about buying a small second hand car. Its just a reality that almost all american insanely overspend on their cars. And even reasonably poor people refuse to use buses or public transport even in places where it is possible.

> Healthcare costs are insane. Daycare costs are insane.

A huge number of people who are both healthy and don't have kids, or don't use daycare also live paycheck to paycheck.

> "those poor people just don't know how to manage their money!"

Its simply a well document fact that people insane overspend on consumtion. There is a reason the term 'house poor' exists. US culture tells everybody you need buy a house or you are failure, and that traps a lot of people. Same for cars, the overspend on cars is insane, the amount of 'poor' people that drive F-150 is off the charts, when you could get a second hand Honda Civic for 1/3 cost.

There are 1 million+ large F-150 like trucks sold in a year in the US. And we know for a fact that many of those are sold to people who will end up having payments mich higher then the recommended monthly acccount. And we know for a fact, that most people don't need these trucks.

We also know that people who have a pattern living paycheck to paycheck very often continue to do so, even as their income increases. Partly because they life-style inflated helped by the fact that as your income grows, your ability to add debt increases as well and many people see this as an oppertunity, rather then a trap.

Changing those things doesn't turn you from poor to rich, but it would mean that instead of living on the edge paycheck to paycheck with constant use of credit cards, instead you could have no credit card, an emergency fund and a savings rate of a modest 5%. There are plenty of people you can find who do this, who are worse off in terms of income then people who live paycheck to paycheck.

Its a fair argument to make that the US make this to hard, specially for people with kids or people who are sick, but those don't account for 30%+ of the population. But to ignore all individual choice is equally silly and infantilizing. People prefering F-150 over retirment savings is just a fact of life, and its not elitist to point it out.