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New York, 8:11 PM
Fri Nov 27
13 posts in the last 24 hours
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11/17/09
11/18/09
11/18/09
#tips
11/18/09
11/19/09
#tips
11/17/09
11/17/09
In Henry, the median income of black families, $56,715 in 2008, approaches that of whites, $69,728 (nationally, the average income gap was $20,000). Blacks in Henry County, many of whom are retirees from the North or professionals who work in Atlanta, are more likely than whites to have a college degree.
and then the very next sentence...
That does not mean that Henry County is a perfect laboratory of equality.
So the Times's OWN CODDAMN REPORTING states outright that blacks make way less money despite having MORE education than whites and they're worried we readers might get the impression that Henry County is "a perfect laboratory of equality." These are like the white people on Mad Men in their obliviousness. #trendwatch
10/20/09
10/20/09
10/20/09
10/20/09
Initially, he seems to challenge the assumptions of this post:
“Rather than trying to come up with a subsistence-based poverty measure about which everybody can agree, we should accept that there is no definitive way to decide who is impoverished and who isn’t. Every three years, researchers from the federal government conduct surveys about the number of appliances in the homes of American families. In 2001, ninety-one per cent of poor families owned color televisions; seventy-four per cent owned microwave ovens; fifty-five per cent owned VCRs; and forty-seven per cent owned dishwashers. Are these families poverty-stricken?”
But as the article progresses, Cassidy brings together evidence from numerous disciplines to show how “relative privation” hurts people psychologically, socially, and even physically. The basic idea: “It appears that, while money matters to people, their relative ranking matters more. ... Relative deprivation is also bad for your health.”
How to assess relative privation? “Since relative deprivation confers many of the disadvantages of absolute deprivation, it should be reflected in the poverty statistics. A simple way to do this would be to classify a household as impoverished if its pre-tax income was, say, less than half the median income—the income of the household at the center of the income-distribution curve.”
In the current political climate, his thoughts on the redistribution of wealth would inevitably raise the specter of socialism: “The conservative case against a relative-poverty line asserts that since some people will always earn less than others the relative-poverty rate will never go down. Fortunately, this isn”t necessarily true. If incomes were distributed more equally, fewer families would earn less than half the median income. Therefore, the way to reduce relative poverty is to reduce income inequality—perhaps by increasing the minimum wage and raising taxes on the rich.”
*John Cassidy, Annals of Economics, “Relatively Deprived,” The New Yorker, April 3, 2006 (link).
10/20/09
However, unlike many truly poor people, my poverty is temporary. Once I graduate with my MBA in December from my no-name school, I'll be making the big bucks....right?
*crickets* #thepoors
10/20/09
In the current economy, a lot of people who are leaving school have to settle for work that may not be related to or commensurate with their academic qualifications. All I can say is: good luck, and work your connections. #thepoors
10/20/09
But...
"we have far more honest priests than thieving priests"
Qualify that. Go ahead, punk. Make my day. #thepoors
10/20/09
I will look into this. I haven't been working in a while, and $200 would go a long way at Trader Joe's. Ain't no shame!
10/19/09
Also, she's going into social work. Shouldn't she be the person lamenting the abuse of the system?
My other roommate and I used to plot ways to report her to the feds when she pissed us off. Handy note: Once you get over $100 of fraudulent food stamps it's a felony. #jschool
10/19/09
10/19/09
Now that I think about it, I'm pretty sure that my volunteer stipend was more than $450 a month. #jschool
10/19/09
It's almost enough for one to despair of the entire welfare system. Almost. #jschool
10/19/09
10/19/09
10/19/09
Further, apparently it's okay for taxpayers to provide government assistance to thousands of Walmart employees who are so poorly paid that they're eligible for a plethora of government programs, hence the reason why I see nothing wrong with AmeriCorps personnel accepting government assistance, especially given the pittance they're paid. #jschool
10/19/09
Note also that the program is based on income per household, not on how much your degree cost or what it might be worth someday. Frankly, I'd rather see qualified people using this resource than starving to death in the streets, but then, I'm not a Republitard.
For every so-called "welfare queen" milking the system, there's a gay kid who got thrown out of his house, or a single mom, or a laid off blue collar guy with a kid to feed. Their survival choices are strictly limited to either public assistance or crime. (Yes, some choose both. Not the point.)
Those who object may pick up some Charles Dickens to remind them of what the good ol' days were like. #jschool
10/19/09
10/19/09
One can't know in advance if there will be a glut of lawyers, doctors, librarians or research assistants when one happens to graduate, and one shouldn't have to speculate on that when pursuing an education in a field where one has proficiency and interest.
By your logic - and you know I love ya - students who aspire to certain fields should make their educational pursuits a strictly economic exercise.
Based on the number of self-entitled, moronic, wealthy jackasses who went to law school with me solely because Mommy and Daddy wanted to be able to say "My son, the lawyah...", I think that all professions are ill-served by that exercise. #jschool
10/19/09
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10/19/09