America's Poverty Is Built by Design

[Celerity]

How did the U.S. become a land of economic extremes with the rich getting richer while the working poor grind it out? Deliberately.

https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2023/05/21/theres-a-path-out-of-poverty-00097399



In late 2020, a crowd of mostly Black and Hispanic workers rallied outside the statehouse in Albany, New York to gather support for a $15-an-hour minimum wage for tipped workers. A group of white people wearing red MAGA hats approached. Coincidentally, the protest was taking place the same day the state legislature was meeting to certify the results of the 2020 presidential election — and MAGA protesters had gathered to challenge the count. You’d expect clashes to ensue. But when some Trump supporters stumbled upon the workers of color pushing for higher wages, they shook hands and joined their protest.

Matthew Desmond recounts this story in the epilogue to his ground-breaking new book, Poverty, By America to suggest that a movement to abolish poverty could transcend our toxically divided politics. Many Americans already know that the core of Desmond’s argument is true: that systems are rigged to favor people who are already advantaged. He makes a refreshing, brutally honest case that poverty is pervasive in America by design, to enable the lifestyles of affluent people. U.S. rates of poverty are substantially higher and more extreme than those found in 25 other developed OECD countries, including Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Poland, Portugal and the United Kingdom.

How did America become a land of economic extremes, with entrenched, grinding poverty for those struggling at the bottom — even as most poor adults who are not seniors are working? Desmond’s greatest contribution is changing the lens from individual behavior — the hoary focus of so many books about poverty — to asking and answering the larger question, “Who benefits from practices that keep people poor?” Poverty, he argues, results from three quintessentially American habits: exploitation of the poor; subsidization of the rich; and the intentional segregation of the affluent and the poor such that opportunity is hoarded and social mobility is rare. Desmond acknowledges the role of anti-Black racism in perfecting Americans’ antipathy to spending for public benefits. Other books engage directly with the “dog-whistling” politics that dissuade working and middle class people from voting their economic interests. Desmond focuses more on making transparent the systems that fabricate scarcity and offers solutions.

He paints a clear picture of the morally fraught systems we all participate in. Well-paid professionals like me benefit as consumers from the poverty wages paid to others in an economy where Uber is a verb and surveilled and squeezed gig workers respond to —and deliver — our every need. Our stock investments swell as companies cut or outsource jobs, stagnate wages and oppose unions. We get free checking; the poor get usurious fees from banks and “payday” lenders. Meanwhile, zoning codes that allow only single-family homes create artificial housing scarcity that enhances our property values while foisting high costs and homelessness on others. Segregation encourages “private opulence and public squalor,” Desmond argues, as affluent people withdraw from public institutions and society systemically disinvests in the public goods ordinary people need.

snip

[The Unmitigated Gall]

1. People in boxes, people on benches...

Needed as a warning. To the rest of us, lest we get too uppity. Too bold. Too demanding.

[walkingman]

2. As the article states, "if the rich pay their taxes

and the government stops over-subsidizing them and instead invests in the general welfare with aid to the poor, poverty can be eliminated, without adding to the deficit."

If should be a clear signal when one of the big items that Conservatives want is to cut IRS funding. If you worship tax cuts and fail to increase income then it means deficit spending. Also, what's up with the constant increasing funding of the military budget. How about cracking down on the price gouging by defense contractors?

[BOSSHOG]

7. Do what you suggest

And the rich will still be rich giving them an incentive for patting themselves on the back for no apparent reason. It’s mind boggling. The greed is sinful.

My wife and I have a nice lil stash. We give big monthly. We are comfortable and happy. I guess I should make a billion, that would make me miserable until I gave most of it away.

[JanMichael]

3. I didn't see Hamilton mentioned. He hated the mobs.

Not sure why he's so revered.

One of his quotes

“a rage for paper money, for abolition of debts, for an equal division of property.”

Was in one of his responses to how Massachusetts was heading after the revolutionary war.

He hated the riff raff.

[KPN]

11. Interesting. Can you recommend a book on Hamilton?

[JanMichael]

12. Read the Federalist Papers.

Madison and Hamilton wrote very elitist concepts.

[Solly Mack]

4. K&R

[intrepidity]

5. Good read

After laying out his analysis, Desmond urges readers to become poverty abolitionists, to spread an ethic that shuns companies that exploit workers and supports government policies that rebalance the social contract toward alleviating poverty rather than helping elites grow their wealth. Importantly, he is not arguing for redistribution per se. He is arguing that if the rich pay their taxes and the government stops over-subsidizing them and instead invests in the general welfare with aid to the poor, poverty can be eliminated, without adding to the deficit.

[TexasBushwhacker]

8. But then who would the slumlords rent to? /sarcasm

Poor people actually keep many industries afloat, from substandard housing, payday loans, used car dealers who sell old cars for inflated prices and charge ridiculous interest rates, dollar stores, etc.

[Farmer-Rick]

13. Actually you are saying what he is saying

The poor and lower middle class support the upper middle class and the filthy rich.

"There would be no rich without the poor," is a common phrase. I think the saying accurately reflects what the US does. It does not reflect what other rich countries do but in the US, abuse of the poor and the masses is encouraged as capitalism.

Who gets the most subsidies from our tax dollars in the US? It is not the poor. Who gets low wages, no benefits and abusive work environments? It is not the filthy rich. Who mostly gets to go to big name colleges that almost guarantee success? It is not the poor. Who mostly gets the prestigious internships that guarantees success? It's not the poor. Who mostly has to live near the pollution spewed by mining and toxic waste plants? It is not the rich. Who gets to live by the pretty parks? It's not the poor. Who mostly gets to build houses by the beach? It is not the poor unless of course the beach is polluted

The poor are preyed up on and overcharged for everything. If it wasn't for them the filthy rich couldn't sell most of their crap made in China, India and Mexico. If not for the poor, who would accept slave wages to pick the rich man's food?

As the post says:

"Poverty, he argues, results from three quintessentially American habits: exploitation of the poor; subsidization of the rich; and the intentional segregation of the affluent and the poor such that opportunity is hoarded and social mobility is rare."

[TeamProg]

6. Well of course! And:

BOOT STRAPS!

[Mr.Bill]

9. As George Carlin once said,

the rich pay little to no taxes and don't do any of the work. The middle class does most of the work and pays most of the taxes.

The poor people are kept there to scare the shit out of the middle class.

[dchill]

10. That's a truism that's also true.

George Carlin was an eminently valuable human being.

[Zeitghost]

16. What percentage of taxes does the middle class pay?

I'm curious.

[Mr.Bill]

17. It's comedy, not a doctoral thesis in economics.

[mathematic]

14. Besides this book, what else did you find in the time capsule from 2013?

[Celerity]

15. a 2023 calendar for you to use

mathematic

14. Besides this book, what else did you find in the time capsule from 2013?

https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2023/05/21/theres-a-path-out-of-poverty-00097399