POVERTY - then & now

[theoldman]

a friend was over last night & we got to talking about poverty. He was complaining bitterly about the price of prescriptions, gasoline, food & just about everything. He was also talking about the extremly low return on savings & investments & how he felt he was poor. I had to agree things may not be as good as they were in the 90's but compared to my childhood we are all very well off.

I then told him of an experience when I was 10 or 11 years old and was uinvited to spend the night with a friend who also spent the summers naked like most of us at that time. This was a cold (for the south) night in the winter & they had a fire going in the potbelly stove. We got into bed which had a corn husk matress & covered up with a blanket made of 2 sheets with newspapers in between. The newspapers were helfd in place by large stiches so they didn't slide around. We were talking about a bunch of different things & he brought up the subject of being poor. Now all of us realized we weren't rich, but we never really thought of us as being poor. We had enough to eat and a house & most of all, a loving family. His comment that I have always remembered was, "I wonder how the poor people who don't have any newspapers keep warm on a cold night."

Anytime I get to thinking I or any of my friends is bad off, I remember this.

Just thought I'd throw this out for all y'all to consider. (Did I slip & show my southern upbringing?)

[theoldman]

a friend was over last night & we got to talking about poverty. He was complaining bitterly about the price of prescriptions, gasoline, food & just about everything. He was also talking about the extremly low return on savings & investments & how he felt he was poor. I had to agree things may not be as good as they were in the 90's but compared to my childhood we are all very well off.

I then told him of an experience when I was 10 or 11 years old and was uinvited to spend the night with a friend who also spent the summers naked like most of us at that time. This was a cold (for the south) night in the winter & they had a fire going in the potbelly stove. We got into bed which had a corn husk matress & covered up with a blanket made of 2 sheets with newspapers in between. The newspapers were helfd in place by large stiches so they didn't slide around. We were talking about a bunch of different things & he brought up the subject of being poor. Now all of us realized we weren't rich, but we never really thought of us as being poor. We had enough to eat and a house & most of all, a loving family. His comment that I have always remembered was, "I wonder how the poor people who don't have any newspapers keep warm on a cold night."

Anytime I get to thinking I or any of my friends is bad off, I remember this.

Just thought I'd throw this out for all y'all to consider. (Did I slip & show my southern upbringing?)

[florida-david]

HI THEOLDMAN - You certainly are wise, and i love hearing your viewpoint on life. i agree, that we could all stop complaining how poor we are if we could just remember how life used to be. not having the conveniences we have available (that we do not need) do not make us poor. i am fortunate to work hard and make a good living, but i do not aspire to be rich, only to enjoy the comforts that my work brings. what gets me angry are those who have too much already and want to keep the poor down. the ones concerned about making the rich richer, and the poor, poorer, really get me mad. that is why i do not like our current power structure, it is run by the selfish and those rich enough to get corporate sponsers to fund their campaigns.

when my son whines about not having anything to do and how mean i am for not having all the lastest electronic gizmos for him to play, i remind him of how the truly poor live and how fortunate he is to have air conditioning, a pool, and other luxuries most people do not have nor that i had as a kid. after offering to take him to the poorest parts of town for a visit, he usually appreciates how lucky he is and stops complaining...

[lovebeingnude]

florida-david:

Yes, money runs our country. There are 2 ways money influences politicians: (1) The money they collect from donations (I don't have a problem with that) and (2) The money they collect from our taxes in order to spend it on marginally useful social projects in order to bribe the masses into thinking they care so they will get re-elected again. Maybe we should have "1 term" term limits.

I don't have a problem with the rich in this country. If we didn't have them, we would be communist or socialist and everything would suck. Those "rich people/companies" helped build this country into the most prosperous in the world (if it isn't, why does everyone want to come here?) We would still be in the 19th century if people didn't have any incentive to follow their dreams and create new and better products and services.

Sure, we could tell people "you are too rich, you can't make anymore", and tax them up the whazoo. But you know what would happen... No more incentive to achieve. No new products or services. Permanent recession.

That cliche is so wrong: "Making the rich, richer and the poor, poorer". Lets analyze that. A business man has a widget he makes. He hires 10 people to make them. His business is going well. He wants to make more money, so he hires another 10 people and makes twice as many widgets and twice as much profit. So far, he is benefiting 20 employees, the suppliers of the raw materials, and the government (due to all the payroll taxes). Everyone's boat is lifted.

That cliche should be "Making the rich poorer will make the poor, poorer".

Now I am by no means a rich man (in fact, I think I have a negative net worth right now). However, I am involved in a small business and if there was no possibility for me to become rich, I would not be doing this right now and there would be 10 less jobs in this country.

[florida-david]

LOVEBEINGNUDE - i have no problem with the rich either, only certain ones of them. the poor rarely ned an architect, so i relie on the wealthy citizens out there for my income.

you have your economics a little wrong though. first, many of the truly rich look for ways to keep themselves that way, either by going out of country to make their widgets or hiring the poor here in the u.s. and than not offering health care, pension, etc. this is how the rich build those widgets and horde their money, rather than spend it. the poor spend all their money on essential items, keeping the economy going by buying the widgets that are made out of this country. i have no problem with people having way too much money, but it is important (in my opinion) that the money be spent on causes that help all of society, not only the wealthy (yes, i am obviously a democrat). did you see the nudes in the news article on the wealthy guy who spreads his wealth among his employees?

either way, as a fellow small business owner (in my opinion), your goal should not only be to make money. you will find you lose valuable friends and employees on the way to your dream of being rich. i would rather work my butt off doing something i love, taking care of all those around me on the way, and if i make a ton of money, that is icing on the cake. i have this feeling that you would agree....

[Outlaw]

Hi All--

This is a nice piece I found on the Internet awhile back. I thought it had a good take on poverty. Enjoy!

THE RICHES OF EASTER

I'll never forget Easter 1946. I was 14, my little sister Ocy 12, and my older sister Darlene 16. We lived at home with our mother, and the four of us knew what it was to do without many things.
My dad had died 5 years before, leaving Mom with seven school kids to raise and no money. By 1946 my older sisters were married, and my brothers had left home.
A month before Easter, the pastor of our church announced that a special Easter offering would be taken to help a poor family. He asked everyone to save and give sacrificially.
When we got home, we talked about what we could do. We decided to buy 50 pounds of potatoes and live on them for a month. This would allow us to save $20 of our grocery money for the offering. When we thought that if we kept our electric lights turned out as much as possible and didn't listen to the radio, we'd save money on that month's electric bill.
Darlene got as many house and yard cleaning jobs as possible, and both of us baby sat for everyone we could. For 15 cents, we could buy enough cotton loops to make three pot holders to sell for $1. We make $20 on pot holders.
That month was one of the best of our lives. Every day we counted the money to see how much we had saved. At night we'd sit in the dark and talk about how the poor family was going to enjoy having the money the church would give them. We had about 80 people in church, so we figured that whatever amount of money we had to give, the offering would surely be 20 times that much. After all, every Sunday the Pastor had reminded everyone to save for the sacrificial offering.
The day before Easter, Ocy and I walked to the grocery store and got the manager to give us three crisp $20 bills and one $10 bill for all our change. We ran all the way home to show Mom and Darlene. We had never had so much money before. That night we were so excited we could hardly sleep. We didn't care that we wouldn't have new clothes for Easter; we had $70 for the sacrificial offering. We could hardly wait to get to church!
On Sunday morning, rain was pouring. We didn't own an umbrella, and the church was over a mile from our home, but it didn't seem to matter how wet we got. Darlene had cardboard in her shoes to fill the holes. The cardboard came apart, and her feet got wet. But we sat in church proudly.
I heard some teenagers talking about the Smith girls having on their old dresses. I looked at them in their new clothes, and I felt so rich. When the sacrificial offering was taken, we were sitting on the second row from the front. Mom put in the $10 bill, and each of us girls put in a $20. As we walked home after church, we sang all the way.
At lunch Mom had a surprise for us. She had bought a dozen eggs, and we had boiled Easter eggs with our fried potatoes! Late that afternoon the minister drove up in his car. Mom went to the door, talked with him for a moment, and then came back with an envelope in her hand. We asked what it was, but she didn't say a word. She opened the envelope and out fell a bunch of money. There were three crisp $20 bills, one $10 and seventeen $1. Mom put the money back in the envelope.
We didn't talk, just sat and stared at the floor. We had gone from feeling like millionaires to feeling like poor white trash. We kids had had such a happy life that we felt sorry for anyone who didn't have our mom and dad for parents and a house full of brothers and sisters and other kids visiting constantly. We thought it was fun to share silverware and see whether we got the fork or the spoon that night. We had two knives which we passed around to whoever needed them. I knew we didn't have a lot of things that other people had, but I'd never thought we were poor.
That Easter Day I found out we were. The minister had brought us the money for the poor family, so we must be poor. I didn't like being poor. I looked at my dress and worn-out shoes and felt so ashamed that I didn't want to go back to church. Everyone there probably already knew we were poor! I thought about school. I was in the ninth grade and at the top of my class of over 100 students. I wondered if the kids at school knew we were poor. I decided I could quit school since I had finished the eighth grade. That was all the law required at that time. We sat in silence for a long time.
Then it got dark, and we went to bed. All that week, we girls went to school and came home, and no one talked much. Finally on Saturday, Mom asked us what we wanted to do with the money. What did poor people do with money? We didn't know. We'd never known we were poor. We didn't want to go to church on Sunday, but Mom said we had to. Although it was a sunny day, we didn't talk on the way. Mom started to sing, but no one joined in and she only sang one verse.
At church we had a missionary speaker. He talked about how churches in Africa made buildings out of sun-dried bricks, but they need money to buy roofs. He said $100 would put a roof on a church. The minister said, "Can't we all sacrifice to help these poor people? We looked at each other and smiled for the first time in a week. Mom reached into her purse and pulled out the envelope. She passed it to Darlene. Darlene gave it to me, and I handed it to Ocy. Ocy put it in the offering. When the offering was counted, the minister announced that it was a little over $100. The missionary was excited. He hadn't expected such a large offering from our small church. He said, "You must have some rich people in this church."
Suddenly it struck us! We had given $87 of that "little over $100." We were the rich family in the church! Hadn't the missionary said so? From that day on I've never been poor again.

~ Eddie Ogan ~