Friar Bijou wrote:
gbaji wrote:
I'm curious what you would accept as evidence of being "pretty poor"?
I said "pretty poor". WTF? I'm sure there's some range between "living in a mud hut" and "able to afford anything you want" that we can safely label as "pretty poor" within the US context.
I'm curious if that's the criteria for poverty before someone can receive food stamps then? No? Then it's meaningless isn't it? My point is that there was a period of time in which my family was easily as poor as a large percentage of the people who receive public assistance today. But we managed to get by, and didn't care that we didn't have soda in the fridge. Try to stay on topic.
Quote:
Eske Esquire wrote:
gbaji wrote:
I'm honestly curious at what point someone is acceptably "pretty poor" in your eyes?
You're going to have to do better than that, I'm afraid. I can cross all those off my list, and we were middle class, at worst.
Then answer the question I asked. Not "abject poverty", but "pretty poor". What do you think that is? And if you can't define it, then how do we decide who gets public assistance in this country? Because clearly, if people on food stamps have enough food to be buying soda, then do they still qualify as "pretty poor" either?
It's just funny because your use of "poor" seems to change based on whether you're assessing my poverty as a child (teen really), versus whether some person on welfare is poor. Strange isn't it? You'll defend with your dying breath the utter necessity of funding assistance for people who are living much more comfortable lives than I did on the grounds that they're poor, but then turn around and insist that I wasn't poor. How the hell does that work in your own head?
Edited, Jan 3rd 2013 2:36pm by gbaji