GREAT ADVICE! It is a pity that so few follow it.

PLEASE don't tell me they PAID for that! #1? *****DUH*****! Number 2 and 3 are pretty obvious ALSO! I have spoken with a LOT of married people about this. I do little surveys on such things. The age the married at clustered around the low 20s. If they had kids, they had them AFTER the marriage. And MOST did fine.

So WHY HIGHSCHOOL? Well, if you don't graduate, it shows SOME cultural or educational problem that WILL haunt you! Besides, employers won't like it.

WHY MARRIAGE? It IS a commitment, and has expenses, so HOPEFULLY there will be some mutual agreements, and if one falls on hard times, the other can help.

WHY wait until after 20? You can better assess your needs and hopefully have the means to provide for them. Before 18, you may be forever in poverty, and before 20, it isn't that much easier. FRANKLY, I would suggest closer to 23 or 24, ESPECIALLY if the mother is going to college.

Steve

They forgot the one that got me.

Pick your spouse very wisely - and STAY married. Divorce can ruin you.

It's great advice for avoiding poverty in America while the marriage part of the equation can be dicey for those that get married and then divorced - especially females.

And I also suspect that if the economy stays lackluster over an extended period of time those positive stat numbers will be lower no matter what people do.

I think the statements are probably true. But they show me something different.

They show me that people who are already poor, tend to act in a different way than middle class and wealthy people. It reads as though they make bad decisions, and start that habit pretty early.

Poor people tend to marry very early. It may mean that they tend to make life changing decisions rashly. Some may drop out of high school because they are pregnant, or married a girl they got pregnant. I have no idea what the statistics are for that.

But these statistics sound like "Wearing a shirt, while committing a crime, makes you 50% less likely to get caught"... which can also be seen as, "Stupid criminals that easily get caught, also tend to go shirtless".

I've had a unique, to me at least, experience being homeless, living in a shelter for a while, and (still) eating at homeless/charity kitchens.

I've noticed many people in this environment and general situation are not positive about much at all. There's a lot of blaming and animosity toward "the system, the rich, Washington (politicians)," and it seems life in general.

Some of these people do work, but the jobs are not good in many, or most ways. But those that work are at least doing that. They don't make much at all and it's not enough to raise them out of what seems to be poverty.

I listen 99% of the time and hear all kinds of things.

Ken

I've noticed that usually the people who are too young and have babies and try to make their relationship work stay poor because they don't get marketable job skills. Don't seem to have the wherewithal to do so. For example, guys who go into construction, but remain laborers and work sporadically instead of becoming a tradesman, sub-contractor, or contractor.

The ones who have babies and don't stay together often go further downhill economically because
they can't keep up on child support, get wages garnished, or eventually go to jail because they did not pay.
And so on further behind the eight ball and further away from being marketable.

A lot of it does seem to be due to too much impulsive behavior, and too much drug and alcohol use.

Dan

BTW Look at that Kanye West guy! I can NOT believe he makes a penny, but he does. How about sports, dance, music, movies, and I say this ONLY because they are so famous. I have known a number of blacks that are doing far better than I am, and they are even working for companies that AREN'T owned by blacks. Of course, blacks own run companies also. Seriously, I don't know how ANYONE can say skin color is such a global handicap.

Steve

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I see this thread about poverty has morphed into a thread about black people and it would be better defined if it was about only poor black people.

I'll say...

Blacks are not blameless for the culture/mindset of a segment of our community that is poor and in danger of staying poor but pretending historic and ongoing racism is not a factor in the equation doesn't make a lot of sense given that this is America after all.

From emancipation until the early 1990s any blacks that tried to help blacks came under serious attack by certain elements of the state and federal governments and let's not forget about the locals.

I'd also like to say this...

I'd like to thank certain white people for helping to mess up this country economically.

You brought into the hating on minorities, small time so-called freeloaders, government in general, a belligerent foreign policy and look what its got this country.

A great nation even with all its warts has been brought low and the historic economic data says it all started in earnest circa 1980.

For the smallest of reasons you helped throw away a formula that resulted in the greatest economy the world had ever known. You thought they were only going to hurt those you hated on but the reality turned out to be much different - and you still haven't learned your lesson.

What they didn't realize was...

... that along with the hating on small time freeloaders, hating on the fed gov, putting minorities in their place, the extra tough talk on foreign policy, ...

... comes an economic philosophy that simply and won't and can't help the average person in this nation or the nation itself prosper economically.

Its a wonderful philosophy for the already wealthy but for no one else.

Here it is in a nutshell...


- Hands Off:

Under the guise of getting gov off our backs but in practice it simply allows nefarious forces to do just about whatever they like to the population.

- Doesn't believe in interfering with businesses and their relationship to customers or their employees - no matter what is happening to the American people.

- Seeks to find more and more ways to shovel more and more money at the already wealthy.

- Makes absolutely no investments in the society or the population.

- Has no real concern for the living standards of the American people - no matter what they say.

- Would rather the "free market" (which really means large corporations) direct this great nation on its way through time and space instead of at least a basic and general plan.

- Most adults are aware of the old saying that if you fail to plan you plan to fail but these folks would rather this great nation have no at least general plan at all.


It doesn't has a chance because of its built-in economy killing attitudes which lead to policies which only slow down and stagnate economic growth.

A robust economy solves a lot of problems but a robust economy is never going to happen with this philosophy.

Thanks for sending a bunch of dangerous, national killing idiots to the national and state governments.

Black folks ain't blameless and neither are some white folks.

Thanks a million for helping to temporarily ruin the best nation in the history of the planet that will bounce back because that is our destiny.

Why is everyone in 'murica obsessed with blacks and whites

I think you can pull it off even without high school if you have the necessary skills. The rest two points I agree with!

I think that more than anything, regardless of race, it's who and what influences you
growing up and right now.

In my previous post, http://www.warriorforum.com/off-topi...ml#post9669957 , the continually poor people I was thinking of as I wrote are white people I know.

In my own life, I never knew either grandfather because one was gone before I was born and the other very soon after. Neither grandmother was a big influence. Dad was a big impact, and the people or books I chose in high school and beyond.

Dan

Well, I never said there weren't poor whites. There certainly ARE. And SOME even have the same kind of culture that CREATES poverty.

Steve

TL - what I disagree with in your statement is calling corps "free market". We haven't had a free market in this country for a long long time. Those corps that have melded with our gov are very good at making sure they have little competition.

And you are right - all sides are guilty. It wasn't just blacks that were slaves and it wasn't only whites that were slave owners. One of the very first slave owners in the US happened to be black.

What is going on now has nothing to do with back then - although I realize it's been one long haul and headache for blacks to achieve what they are achieving now...especially with an active poor that are screaming how evil everyone else is. However - our current economy is our fault for letting the rich of all races to stomp the crap out of the rest of us. We're being programmed to hate the poor instead of the people that are making/keeping us that way.

I have to disagree with this as you can't judge a persons willingness too success in life.

#1 I know 3 people that drop out of high school to start their own business and now are muti-millionaires.

#2 #3 are a joke. It does make it harder, but again the " will" of anyone can overcome anything.

So final thought don't judge anyone one, because that so called "poor person" without the designer clothes , fancy cars, might just be a millionaire, that simply lived within his/her own means.

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