New Rule:Follow

MAYBE, and that doesn't include a healthy drink like milk or a glass of OJ.



Flat out bullsh*t. A loaf of *cheap* bread runs about $2 here. Even the cheapest pack of ham or bologna will run you another $2.50 to $3.00. That doesn't include mayo or mustard, or any lettuce/tomato/cheese combo one might want on a sandwich. We're talking bread and meat only to stay under $5.00, and that doesn't include the cost of the tin foil or plastic bag to wrap it in. And if we're talking about lunch at work or school, there's probably the cost of a drink, unless you bring tap water in a thermos.



There's no way you can prepare 7 nights worth of any dinner containing fresh meat AND one or more sides for under $15/20 bucks total. The meat alone will cost you the $15 dollars or more.


Edited, Jan 19th 2009 8:40pm by BrownDuck

Lol. And you jumped on me for semantics? You said "spent". Past tense. Those sites are projecting what the war(s) might cost us total in the future.

I found some that said 3 trillion. They're all guesses. How about we stick with the actual costs? And didn't you start out saying that this was the amount lost in Iraq over a 12 month period of time? Lol. Can you please just drop this? You were wrong. You quoted some bogus numbers and got called on it.




I'm sorry. I don't have a clue where "here" is. For all I know, by "here" you mean "people living in the basement under my parents house" or something. Silly me. I'm going to stick with national statistics instead of some vague moving target.

Your statement has no meaning if it doesn't apply to anyone else. We were talking in general about welfare. Interjecting with some off your head numbers that don't jive at all with the nation as a whole is kinda irrelevant, don't you think? Unless you think that everyone on this forum lives "here"...?



Um... Whatever. If you're that poor, don't own a car. I managed to own and operate an old beater for many years, without ever earning more than about a dollar over minimum wage. Maybe this has magically become impossible to do, but I seriously doubt it. How much does a bus pass cost?



No. It wont.



See above. Figure it out. I managed just fine living in what is arguably one of the most expensive places in the freaking country. I'm sure you can manage. Maybe make some friends and share expenses? Just a thought? So far, we've been looking at a single person living completely on their own. Unless you managed to go through your entire life so far without getting to know anyone, that seems like a "worst case" scenario already. And lets face it. If you don't know anyone, why are you still living in South Dakota? Your thumb is free, right?



They don't need much of those things, no.



Wait! I'm a poor excuse of a human being because I believe that people can manage to provide for themselves if they just try? I'm bringing a message of hope and here you go trashing me for it? I'm insulted! :)


No really!

Sure, even using your numbers it is nowhere near the cost per person you tossed out. I'm no fan of theft nor the war, but you aren't helping things by making things up.

Even if you assume 100% theft rate, ie. zero $ went to actually fund the war this divides out by the population of the US to be a bit less than 7k per person. Again, assuming that 0% of the money spend to fight the war was used in fighting it.

Nowhere near the ~150k you tossed out there.

Edited, Jan 19th 2009 9:27pm by Timelordwho

Ok, when talking about care and management of society, it's very important to be talking about the right statistics.

In Australia, the Average weekly wage in 2008 was roughly AU$1,200.00 (US$739.00). But that's skewed by all the top 5% of earners.

The MEDIAN Average wage, that is, the figure that 50% of wage/salary earners recieve less than, and 50% of earners receive more than, is AU$470 (US$313.00) a week.

Minimum wage is about AU$14.00 (US$9.32) an hour, which is AU$560.00 ($373.00) per week. A lot of minimum wage earners are part time, which is how 50% of Australian wage earners actually earn less than the legal weekly minimum wage.

Part time and contract workers are desirable because there are less employer costs in terms of leave, sick-leave and superannuation entitlements that full time workers have. So if an employer can get away with two part-time workers instead of one full time worker, or con workers into offering themselves as a "contractor", s/he will.

In Australia, if you wanted to toss around social, welfare and tax policy based on the idea that "most" people with a wage were on US739.00, because that's the Average wage, you'd be very, very far off.

And the wage statistics are a far cry from the income statistics. The income statistics are skewed much worse, with wealthy asset owners blowing the average income sky high, whereas there is also a substantial portion of the population with neither wage, nor income, apart from welfare.

Any working age (21-65) jobseeker (form required with business contact details to prove you have applied for a minimum of 10 jobs that week) receives AU$225.00 ($150.00) a week from the government, no more, unless they also pay rent, in which they get some extra help for rent.

It doesn't matter if they have never worked before, or if they were on a huge wage before and lost their job through no fault of their own, and have a lovely family home with a huge mortgage. You sign up for "Newstart Allowance", you demonstrate you are applying for jobs, you receive US$150 per week. If you haven't found a job by 6 or 8 months or something, they bring you in for a series of small classes on presentation for interviews, and with resume help. If you haven't found a job by a year, you start working on community projects for 15 hours a week, for the rest of your time on the Allowance, as well as the job application requirements.

You effectively work for the federal government part time, although all three levels of government, and charities and other community organisations can put in bids to get Newstart Allowance recipients come work for them part time, if the bid seems a worthy enough cause.

Edited, Jan 19th 2009 10:24pm by Aripyanfar

Why even try to play it off as a coincidence? I mean.. sometimes it's just not worth it.

Bijou was upfront about the fact that he was speaking to a subset of the population. Why don't we look at the median of working class people, such as sales people?

But seriously, gbaji, there are people who work and are still homeless. If you'd like to come to Boston, I'll introduce you to them and you can tell them about your theories about how they should live.

Wow.

BS. He was making a broad generalization about the use of government funded welfare programs as a whole. Otherwise, why on earth bring up the argument about how much money the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan would have been if spent on each person/family/whatever? It's a bogus argument all by itself (and doubly so with the horribly inaccurate data), let's not compound that by trying to pretend that he was just talking about South Dakota or something...

He was using the wages "here" to justify the same broad argument about welfare. Heck. I didn't even know where "here" was until several posts into the issue. And Let's not forget that he was wrong about those numbers as well.

There are some good arguments for government assistance programs. Lying about wages and costs of other things isn't one of them. Just sayin...



I linked the entire set of wages for South Dakota. Feel free to look up your own state if you want. His numbers were bogus. There are *zero* occupations in South Dakota with an average wage of $7/hour or less. Yet, he insisted that this was the average of all available jobs in his area.

Maybe he's just incredibly mistaken. Maybe he's outright lying. It's irrelevant either way.

But for the record: The national median income of all sales related jobs is $11.40. The lowest category listed is "Cashiers" at $8.25.

I'm sorry if the reality doesn't match the perception, but don't expect me to sit here quietly while that false perception is used to argue an issue like welfare. Again. Make your arguments, but don't make up facts to support it. Especially such easily disproved ones...



Yes. I'm sure there are. I didn't say there weren't. This is what I said:




1. Most guys living at a homeless shelter work full time. Do we need to go further than this?

2. If they work full time (legally, not some under the table job), they can afford rent. They may not be able to afford anything else, but the numbers don't lie. Full time minimum wage in South Dakota is $6.55, right? Full time is just a bit over a thousand dollars a month. I'm quite sure that it's possible to rent a place somewhere in the state of South Dakota for less than that.



Tell me what part of my statement: "I find that pretty darn hard to believe" was incorrect. No innuendo. No speculation. No inventing new meanings for what I said. Look at what I wrote and tell me if it was correct or not.


He rattled off a series of falsehoods. I called him on it. It's a done deal.

Yeah, gbaji, getting an apartment is only one expense. And Bijou was clear about what he was talking about. You are even backpedaling in your post.

I buy maybe one new article of clothing a month, I don't buy expensive clothes either, but I don't generally shop at thrift stores unless I'm looking for something in particular. But even buying used clothes to replace worn out, or unflattering/poor fitting clothes (poor people have right to be fasionable too), you would probably still spend around 1-5$ a month.

And I go through shoes like crazy. I buy a 20$ pair at target every few months. So on average, I probably spend about 100$ a year on shoes. That doesn't include non-work shoes. I still have a few pairs of boots/shoes/sandals for wearing out on the town.

As for a phone, that's negligible. I can understand that a phone is still a "luxury" item, but depending on your job and circumstances, a phone may be a necessity.

And to say that poor people don't need much medicine or doctor fees... wow... just wow.

Eating "late" at night is not a bad thing. It's a myth caused by the fact that most people eat high sugar and fat snacks late at night.

Edit:
Oh, and usually eat more than their 1200-2000 calories needed by snacking later.

Edited, Jan 19th 2009 11:50pm by TirithRR

Yeah, if you like being a gremlin.

Also, people are supposed to eat four meals that are small, not two meals. They are more productive throughout the day if they eat.

But really, it comes down to one thing, gbaji's answer to addressing poverty is telling poor people that maybe they should just eat less.

LIKE SERIOUSLY. He's like a made up D1cken's @#%^ing character.

Edited, Jan 19th 2009 11:51pm by Annabella