[ohanian]

A sad sombre article by Rolling Stone Magazine.... Article

[Pops]

Being homeless is my great fear. When doomers talk about bugging out at the first sign of trouble I just don't get it because I'd do just about anything to not be a refugee. Maybe its just not trusting the system enough to believe in the next paycheck or maybe I think that normalcy bias will keep me in a bad place too long or maybe I'm just paranoid.

I don't fear the great race war or black helicopters or even Mad Max but I do fear that worthless feeling of not being able to support yourself and family.

However long it takes to lose everything, to get to the point where you're driving away from your repossessed home, the final unraveling seems eye-blink fast, because there is no way to imagine it. Even if you've been unemployed for a year and are months-delinquent on your mortgage, you still won't have a mental category for your own homelessness; it's impossible to project yourself into the scenario. The reality, when it occurs and endures, seems to have sprung from nowhere.

Because of where the reporter got the stories, the Safe Parking program, everyone is living in a car but do you notice how the car is still the last vestige of normalcy? The last thing to give up even if it means a $500/mo payment.

[PrestonSturges]

There's a lot of classic mistakes there. This lady's business depended on the landscaping trade and was grossing $300,000 a year where the margins and actual profit aren't that great and she probably took on a lot of fixed costs for her business.

If I were in the situation of running out of money, I would leave a 6 month window to empty the house and put it on the rental market. Is the problem that people wait until the bank puts a lien on the property so they can't rent it out ? I guess if you have kids the instinct is to tough it out and try to defend the nest.

[Plantagenet]

The original "grapes of wrath" wasn't about people in one of the richest communities in the US and the charities and Federal welfare benefits like section 8 housing vouchers and food stamps that they rely on. The original "grapes of wrath" was about people moving across the country to a region where there were jobs.

A true 21st century "grapes of wrath" story would involve these people getting in their vans and driving to North Dakota to get jobs.

[Lore]

The original "grapes of wrath" wasn't about people in one of the richest communities in the US and the charities and Federal welfare benefits like section 8 housing vouchers and food stamps that they rely on. The original "grapes of wrath" was about people moving across the country to a region where there were jobs.

That's because none of those programs existed then. Otherwise even more people would be driving their vintage vehicles to ND. Where they can sit in migrant camps looking to make a quick claim on the gold rush.

A true 21st century "grapes of wrath" story would involve these people getting in their vans and driving to North Dakota to get jobs.

People are and like "The Grapes of Wrath" when that bubble pops there will be a lot of discouraged people to deal with. Making it a true 21st century Grapes of Wrath story.

[Plantagenet]

people would be driving their vintage vehicles to ND. Where they can sit in migrant camps looking to make a quick claim on the gold rush.

You are right. This is the 21st century --- if they'd had food stamps and welfare back in the 1930s everybody would've just gotten food stamps and a welfare apartment in Santa Barbara---preferably not too far from the beach.

[PrestonSturges]

No the Grapes of Wrath was about people who were economic refugees trekking from place to place where there weren't any jobs, and they worry about being robbed or beaten by labor camp bosses or hostile locals or being used as slave labor.

And finally they found a gubmint WPA camp which is clean and safe and had electricity and water.

[mattduke]

We walk into the illuminated, multihued splendor of Whole Foods

Whole Foods for breakfast? Beats my oatmeal.

[Plantagenet]

And finally they found a gubmint WPA camp which is clean and safe and had electricity and water.

You must've read the cliff-notes version with the last 2 pages torn out.

IN the real novel they do briefly visit Weedpatch Camp, a camp operated by the Resettlement Administration, a New Deal agency, but there is not enough money and space to care for all of the needy, so the book continues to tell how the Joads leave the "gubmint camp" and various members of the family go through many more trials and tribulations, including being accused of killing someone, one of them being killed, working as scabs on a peach farm, working as labor organizers, etc. etc.

Nowadays they'd just have to turn left at the California border and then apply for food stamps and a welfare apartment in Santa Barbara.


Read the real book----not the Cliff Notes version.

[PrestonSturges]

Nowadays they'd just have to turn left at the California border and then apply for food stamps and a welfare apartment in Santa Barbara.
.

And I guess you didn't read the article where it talked about the "welfare apartments.":

The waiting time for Section 8 housing, if you have priority status, is six months to a year. If you belong to the vast majority who don't have priority status – if you're not elderly, disabled or a veteran with dependents – the wait is between four and eight years.

[Plantagenet]

The waiting time for Section 8 housing, if you have priority status, is six months to a year. If you belong to the vast majority who don't have priority status – if you're not elderly, disabled or a veteran with dependents – the wait is between four and eight years.

Yup.

AND thats the problem with relying on the government to give you a handout instead of going out and getting a job-----no matter how high the taxes go or how much money the Obama administration borrows from China, or how many times Obama and the dems loosen the rules for getting food stamps or extend unemployment benefits, there's never enough of other people's money to go around.

[PrestonSturges]

The Grapes of Wrath was an industrial/ecologic collapse.

Irt was also due to land speculation, excessively high level of price supports that encouraged production in ww1, and then the return of european grain production after ww1 leading to US grain price collapses.

[Lore]

The waiting time for Section 8 housing, if you have priority status, is six months to a year. If you belong to the vast majority who don't have priority status – if you're not elderly, disabled or a veteran with dependents – the wait is between four and eight years.

Yup.

AND thats the problem with relying on the government to give you a handout instead of going out and getting a job-----no matter how high the taxes go or how much money the Obama administration borrows from China, or how many times Obama and the dems loosen the rules for getting food stamps or extend unemployment benefits, there's never enough of other people's money to go around.

Yup.

There goes the bogeyman government meme again.

[cephalotus]

[quote="PlantagenetYup.

AND thats the problem with relying on the government to give you a handout instead of going out and getting a job-----no matter how high the taxes go or how much money the Obama administration borrows from China, or how many times Obama and the dems loosen the rules for getting food stamps or extend unemployment benefits, there's never enough of other people's money to go around. [/quote]

The real problem for the poor and unlucky in your society are those people that WANT them to starve (and die?) because they envy them even their meal and their rooftop or the view at the beach. It's not a lack of money, but simply a lack of empathie, somthing that differents (most) Homo sapiens from other animals.

[PrestonSturges]

People who blame every misfortune on some moral failure are rebuked by the Bible (see "Job's comforters.") Then there's the Urban Dictionary of "haters"

Hating, the result of being a hater, is not exactly jealousy. The hater doesnt really want to be the person he or she hates, rather the hater wants to knock somelse down a notch...... They will turn your good qualities around and make it look like something bad because they just arent happy with themselves and can't achieve anywhere near what you have.

And haters are the product of alcoholic parents who undermined and sabotaged and ridiculed them as children, so they grow up be sadists like their addicted parents.

[dsula]

[quote="PlantagenetYup.

AND thats the problem with relying on the government to give you a handout instead of going out and getting a job-----no matter how high the taxes go or how much money the Obama administration borrows from China, or how many times Obama and the dems loosen the rules for getting food stamps or extend unemployment benefits, there's never enough of other people's money to go around.

The real problem for the poor and unlucky in your society are those people that WANT them to starve (and die?) because they envy them even their meal and their rooftop or the view at the beach. It's not a lack of money, but simply a lack of empathie, somthing that differents (most) Homo sapiens from other animals.[/quote]
Really? So, you too, think that being poor and unlucky is NEVER, EVER the fault of the poor and unlucky because of bad choices in life? It is of course always the fault of the successful, the corporations, the government or some other mysterious force.

[ohanian]

Generation X, the amount of wealth they had lost is XXX (obscene)

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/06/15/generation-x-has-suffered_n_1600178.html?utm_hp_ref=recession

[PrestonSturges]

Really? So, you too, think that being poor and unlucky is NEVER, EVER the fault of the poor and unlucky because of bad choices in life? It is of course always the fault of the successful, the corporations, the government or some other mysterious force.

Not one of thos neo-pagan "prosperity Christians" are you?

[cephalotus]

Really? So, you too, think that being poor and unlucky is NEVER, EVER the fault of the poor and unlucky because of bad choices in life? It is of course always the fault of the successful, the corporations, the government or some other mysterious force.

I didn't say that. Sometimes (often?) it's the fault of the people or at least a lack of finnacial preperedness, but I do not want that people have to beg for food in my country, I do not want people with now shelter and if if it's the fault of those people to lose a job (often it isn't) I would not rob them from the oportunity to get another one, because they have nowhere to sleep or take a shower or access the interent.

I relation to other expensese a minimum of welfare to everyone is just peanuts and I assume that you get the money back several times if those people get a good paying job again. In my opinion it's plain stupid to let people slip into desperation.

Btw, I also wonder why none of their friends and relatives offer them a room in their home?