When you are poor you spend the majority of your brain cycles dealing with your situation.
What can I afford to eat today? How am I gonna pay the electricity bill? How am I gonna fix my broken 20yo car? Which grocery has the cheapest diapers? Should I switch on the heating today or are there colder days coming this month?
If you are well off none of the above is even a thing.
I think this under-sells the situation. I grew up in a poor, half-immigrant neighborhood in the 90s in Brooklyn. Despite the limitations you describe some people also asked themselves questions like "how do I make sure my kid takes the hardest math class in the school?" and "how do I get my kid to sign up for the magnet school exam" etc.
Those things didn't cost more money (nobody had any) but they reflected the focus on getting their kids out of that situation. The kids whose parents thought this way in my hood are mainly in the 1% now. The kids whose parents didn't think this way have a by-and-large the same life their parents did.
This is very true and I agree with the core points. I also think that there is more to be said for the skills/advantages that aren't easily quantifiable (e.g., habits passed down from parents, mentors, etc) and have a tremendous impact on upward mobility. Those habits are usually reinforced by the culture and if you are unlucky—more unlucky than just being born poor—then that can have an even larger impact on your odds (think of people who are born black, poor, with one parent, and in certain areas in the US).
I am not an expert but I do expect the epigenetics field of study to help us build a better understanding of the things touched on in this paper.
P.S. you do have a "point". Someone saying that you don't is a cop-out so they don't have to think about how to engage in a conversation, debate, or discourse.
Yeah you can't replace having great parents with anything.
This is why our current solutions are failing so badly, but telling people they are responsible for their children's outcomes does not get as many votes as telling them that the government is responsible. Just make sure to vote for us and we will fix all your problems!
I'm very skeptical of the claim that most of the kids with good parents in your poor neighborhood ended up in the 1%. Even with good parents, kids can grow up to be dumb and poorly socialized.
Also, "poor" as you're using it here might be too broad a term. The amount of brain cycles that parents can spare for their kid's academic performance is inversely related to how much time they're worrying about food, whether or not the utilities will be shut off, how to work overtime and keep the kid safe, etc.
> The kids whose parents thought this way in my hood are mainly in the 1% now. The kids whose parents didn't think this way have a by-and-large the same life their parents did.
Interesting. But it’s worth noting that many different causal mechanisms can explain that data. For example it could be that parents that think that way are pretty smart and good at long-term planning / delayed gratification, and such traits are highly heritable. So kids inherit those traits and do well.
You can avoid getting your kids out of that situation by not having any; it seems like an increasingly popular option. DINK or SINK makes it much easier to stay out of poverty.
> The kids whose parents thought this way in my hood are mainly in the 1% now.
This is comforting fantasy. One of the most dire statistics in the US is that black people consistently place more value on education and getting certifications than white people do, and that it doesn't help them (as a group) in the market at all. A black person with a college degree has about the same likelihood of being hired as a white high school graduate who has spent time in prison.
It's also a slander on the poor. You either think that fewer than one percent of the poor place value on education, or you think that class is so hypermobile that far more than one percent of the poor are ending up in the 1%. The idea that all the worthy poor automatically go to heaven is, with the slightest inspection, a statistical impossibility, unless you believe that the poor are almost never worthy.
edit: also, where the hell are these worthy poor parents coming from, and how did they manage to stay poor with so much virtue?
That was really impactful. I grew up pretty okay, but lots of my friends were very poor. I remember experiencing several of these things but I know for a fact they experienced many of them. They were good people who otherwise didn't deserve that struggle.
I read that many (10? 15?) years ago and it changed me. It literally, changed me. That blog post, and its comments (including one by the sister of the author... really difficult stuff) is incredibly hard and important to read.
In many cases, the poor have created that situation themselves. In fact that's the reason they are poor: the income may actually be decent, but spending is uncontrolled.
Many well-off people care about these things. They cook for themselves to save money, they monitor their electricity usage, buy reliable second hand cars, look at the diaper prices and wear warm clothes instead of overheating the space. Some of them do it even if they don't have to, making it a waste of their valuable time, but for those with low middle-class income, it is the difference between a rather good standard of living and poverty.
In fact, if you are really good at "dealing with your situation", chances are that you won't stay poor for long. Not only you will make the best of whatever income you have, but it is also a highly sought after skill, and you may up with a well paying job or a profitable business.
But it is usually a learned skill, and other poor people are unlikely to teach you, because they failed at it themselves, it is a vicious circle.
>When you are poor you spend the majority of your brain cycles dealing with your situation.
I call it "Poor Brain/Rich Brain", and neither requires you to be rich or poor, although they are heavily correlated. A Poor Brain person will always take the immediate reward, even if it's not crucial to their survival. They fail the marshmallow test [0]. Rich Brain people will weigh the immediate reward against future opportunities, even if the immediate reward would significantly enhance their life, and the future opportunity is vague and undefined. It's about understanding that how you are perceived in certain situations can far outweigh your own ability to change your circumstances.
I'm not sure if you are alluding to this or not but the most obvious correlation between the marshmallow test in poverty is that people who grow up in poverty do not believe in future rewards. Their experience is that if someone tells you that you will get a marshmallow later, that marshmallow will never arrive.
"A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush" accurately describes the experience of many people who grew up in poverty. It's a proverb for a reason.
Nice for you to make stuff up. The reality is that most statistics show that poor people tend to be much better with money than rich people. The myth that that poor people are poor because of poor management skills is just a stereotype that rich people tell themselves to feel good. Poor people are poor because they lack money. It's been shown over again the best way to get people out of poverty is to give them money. That's why microloan systems were so successful. Moreover financial training has essentially zero effect on lifting people out of poverty.
You don't need to make up an inaccurate metaphor which will annoy people, bringing in a bunch of unsupported baggage.
You're talking about time preference. What you've decided to call "poor brain" is simply high time preference, and "rich brain" is low time preference.
There. Now you don't need to defend the implicit statistical correlation, or deal with those who are justly annoyed because it's unsupported and classist.
I would've failed the Marshmallow Test as a child. I failed it this morning grabbing breakfast; I got 2 muffins instead of a single bagel. I'm not exactly hurting for money.
If you eat the marshmallow now, you get a marshmallow.
If you wait, it WILL disappear. You don't get a marshmallow.
Basically, for poor people, the "future" is just future suffering, judgemental assholes in government cutting more funds cause you made $10 more this month (welfare cliff), and your sad equipment breaking down at the worst case causing whatever meager savings to evaporate like smoke.
I think it also has a weird effect on how you save money. I have been broke before and worked for < $15/hr from the ages of 16-25, but I came from a middle class family and always had the mindset that I would someday have money.
I think being raised poor imbues you with the opposite mentality, that you will inevitably end up being broke. This has played out a few times in front of my eyes when friends from poor families come into a windfall and burn through it within a few months. It was like they subconsciously knew they would wind up broke again so why not?
I see this play out with my partner. I was raised in middle class paradise (small town Midwest) whereas my partner grew up in poverty in the mountains. Now they have a better job than me but they tend to spend lots of money on silly things and can’t save like I can. The mindset that money is for the future is something that is slowly sinking in for them (a shared account for future bills helped a lot!). On the other hand, I think I’ve become less of a miser.
To me an extra $100 is that much closer to a safe retirement. For them it’s 4 candles. Compromising on 2 candles has worked well for us.
There is something to be said at least of the philosophy of spending money when you have good health and free time, than being on the opposite spectrum of some joyless miser who might die one day never taking advantage of what they worked to save for themselves. You might die before 50 you never know.
There's an exponential inverse law. Being too far below poverty makes everything 10 times harder. Being far above makes everything safer, simpler, less costly (you have time, resources to take risks, and you have people willing to give you hints to ensure better odds).
And that's just the problems you can control. If you are poor and live in a bad neighborhood, you're probably worried about getting to/from work without getting jumped. Everything is filthy. There's trash everywhere. You probably live near environmental hazards like an airport, factory, or some public works. My neighborhood growing up was ringed with an airport, sewage treatment plant, junk yards, and the remnants of manufacturing industry. The air was gross and it was always loud. These kinds of things just absolutely wear you down.
“Poor people” cannot be lumped into a single group.
Some respond to their problems like you mention: they dwell on the scarcity and try to problem solve. I’m not convinced that group is the majority of poor (at least in developed countries).
There are many low income people who do not really worry or think about those things at all. They are incredibly reactive vs proactive and do not plan well. They don’t really worry about whether or not they can pay the electric bill—either they will pay it or they won’t.
Frankly I wonder what influences what weird hangups being poor/relatively poor gives people. Like, when I was growing up I remember my mom and grandmother discussing exactly this - oh, this store has chicken on discount, and the market at blah neighborhood has the cheapest tomatoes, I'll be in the neighborhood and can pick up some for you. However, I got all the useful hangups from it and none of the poverty trap ones, as far as I'm aware.
A big one, I generally have disdain for status goods, probably because I couldn't have them as a kid so I convinced myself they don't matter. This one I'm not planning to fix :)
Or, I mechanically buy things I need on discount and optimize minor things like that without much mental effort. I have to train myself now to notice when I do make effort, so I don't waste time saving 5 bucks anymore.
Or a weird one, I am averse to buying anything that I cannot afford /very/ easily, I remember the first time I saved enough money from odd jobs and gifts to upgrade my computer (early aughts), I was deathly afraid to do it - cause if something happened to my years-old shitty computer I could use the money to buy a new one 3 times over, but if I spent the money now on the new one and something happened to it I'd be SOL, better stick with the old shitty computer. When having money, it translated into e.g. buying a house I could afford very easily ("the cheapest house on the best street", sorta) instead of maxing out like most people I know and buying as much house as practical... However in smaller things, I have to really force myself to spend money, e.g. to not buy crappy air tickets just cause they are a bit cheaper, and such.
Why cannot everyone get the good hangups from poverty? :)
Why is it that outcomes are not the same? Most poor folks remain such, and live their lives pro-creating young, etc. A minority of them overcome the situation given the circumstances presented: if it is a country in dire straits, they immigrate out. If it is the U.S. or another rich country, they make it work.
In places like LA and NYC and Chicago, there are immigrants who made it, poor who made it and poor who didn't.
I would say, when I was poor, I was less busy dealing with the situation. No need to choose between all of those Michelin starred restaurants, just eat the bread and wash down with tea. No need to think where to invest - in stocks or in bonds - as there was nothing to invest. No need to wash the car - just hop on the bus or walk. And every girl loved me and not my money for sure!
Indeed. If you wanna understand this more in-depth, I suggest the book "Can't Catch a Break: Gender, Jail, Drugs, and the Limits of Personal Responsibility". It does exactly what it says on the lid, an amazing book.
The actual poor people I know spend more time worrying about how to afford cigarettes, rather than thinking of the electric bill (which is paid for by the government).
The cigarette seller at one of the major train station downtown is this economic issue in a singular nutshell. He sells cigarettes for a dollar each. No pack costs $24 even with all the taxes but this man gets enough work his way to be there every day. He’s pretty well dressed and personable too not like he is disheveled and desperate. I guess he’s probably clearing well north of minimum wage after his expenses bothering with this.
Of course, there will always be someone who has it way worse or lives inside an underdeveloped region but this isn't some kind of competition.
To observe the lifelong negative effects of growing up poor one doesn't have to grow up in absolute squalor.
Living in a large German city, I also never owned a car and didn't feel poor for the fact.
The issue with this sort of gatekeeping definition is: why stop there? There are a billion people living on less than a dollar a day, now they're the "really poor people", you were just lower-middle class.
The concept of the poverty line is somewhat artificial but it avoids this sort of pointless digression.
This is why "billionaire works 80 hours a week so you should too" is idiotic. Assuming, say, Elon Musk really does work 80 hours a week (being an edgy shitlord on Twitter is not work), do you really think he has all of the same duties you do? Does he drive his kids to school? Does he get stuck in traffic on his commute to work? Does he cook dinner and help his kids with homework?
It's easy to work 80 hours a week when you have people taking care of all of your other needs.
It's not easy. I know people who have nannies, cleaners, gardeners, etc. but they still don't work 80 hours a week.
Somebody with a fairly normal job could, in principle (assuming employer allows it, opportunities exist, etc.), work 80 hours a week and spend their entire extra income on a full-time assistant for their daily chores. The more your hourly income is higher than the assistant's, the more economical that becomes. A FAANG level programmer could absolutely do that, but they typically don't, probably because it's not easy!
You don't even need an assistant if you have no kids, live walking distance from work, and get all your meals by eating out/delivery. You won't have much housework because you won't spend much time there.
Having grown up lower middle class with parents from a former Eastern bloc country, I feel that my mentality has very often held me back from taking risks in career, education and personal life, because there was no safety net to fall back on if the risky move wouldn't pay off.
I'm good at surviving with very little money or food, but at the age of 42, I feel now like I had let life pass me by, having never developed ambitions or passions, and living like a "rat", is also very unappealing to potential love interests.
I grew up very poor in the USA (in a housing project). I ended up becoming successful/wealthy by most people's yardstick, but it took a long time for me to grow out of the poor mindset.
For the longest time I never bought anything for myself. I had half a million in income and wouldn't even buy a snack or anything because it felt "wrong" the same way I couldn't justify it when I was a kid.
Before I was married I didn't even own a bed (I coded on a lawn chair in my apartment and used a cardboard box for my table. I didn't own a TV, car, etc.
Even though I build things for my livelihood, I couldn't justify buying a new machine, etc.
I started to come out of that mindset after getting married. I enjoyed buying things for others (my spouse, then my kids). My spouse then urged (forced) me to buy things for myself. Come to think of it, maybe I never grew out of that mindset. If I wasn't married I would still be living that way. The only reason I'm not is because my wife urges (forces) me not to.
I get you. It took me a looong time to come to terms with the fact that I can buy myself some nice things, even though I was already gifting nice things to others. I still only rarely buy nice stuff for myself, but I am learning. I bought myself a high-end computer (5950x & RTX 3070) 3 years ago, and I realized how important it is to spend -- it's sometimes cheaper than buying it later (it was the beginning of the silicon crisis), and you get to enjoy it a lot. I still pay a lot of attention to what I buy and for what purpose, but I am less crazy about not spending it.
It takes actual time to learn to spend, and you gotta be patient with yourself.
> Before I was married I didn't even own a bed. [...] My spouse then urged (forced) me to buy things for myself.
I worked for years while sleeping on the floor (on a bedsheet, over carpet), even once I could arguably afford a bed. It took a girlfriend to convince me that I should finally, urgently buy a bed (well, an unfinished pine futon frame, from a warehouse outlet).
Maybe the current pause in VC-powered-growth startups means founders&engineers with latent frugality skills will really shine? :)
Something that I've suspected is that "poverty mentality" may not be the full picture.
It seems to me that one aspect of "poverty mentality" is a refusal to go outside of "the rules" even when doing so would clearly be within the socially acceptable gray area. I'm not talking about someone with privilege selfishly believing that the rules don't apply to them. I mean minor things like putting up a lost cat flier without a permit, ducking into a random restaurant and asking if they have napkins to clean up a spill, or teaching a small yoga class in a public park without a permit. The fear seems to be that if those in authority are given any opportunity to crack down or refuse a request then they will do so.
What I have noticed is that it actually does seem like those in authority are more strict with them than they are for me (note that in this case I'm talking about people who are the same race and in some cases the same gender as me).
I've come to suspect that in addition to "poverty mindset", there may also be some sort of unconscious body language or other indicators that allow people to subconsciously pickup that someone comes from poverty. I don't have any proof of this, it's just something that I've suspected. So I don't know if there would be any value in trying to look at any of these potential cues?
That's a surprising claim to me. I live in a fairly poor area and people seem very willing to throw litter out of their cars, blast bass so loud it shakes my house, do drugs in public view, or commit flagrant traffic/parking violations (no value judgments here, just being objective) compared to other places I've lived.
It is also trivially true that poor people are more likely to commit crimes (source[1] if needed, though). Of course, that is likely biased by the selective enforcement you call out.
Perhaps the two can be rectified as a bimodal distribution: Poor people are either dramatically more or dramatically less likely to commit crimes based on how they respond to their environment. Say poor people are more likely to be exposed to crime and thus presented with the choice, and you can respond to high scrutiny by treading carefully or just giving up on it and doing whatever ("They'll punish me regardless, may as well get something out of it.").
Because getting convicted of a given crime is relatively unlikely to begin with, the low crime group doesn't substantively reduce the conviction rate but the high crime group drives it up dramatically. And I am more able to notice the guy blasting bass at 80 mph than the hundreds who quietly pass by.
> one aspect of "poverty mentality" is a refusal to go outside of "the rules" ... The fear seems to be that if those in authority are given any opportunity to crack down or refuse a request then they will do so.
The fear is still valid regardless of their race, ethnicity, gender, etc. if they didn't move away from the poverty. Most do move away, but not all can.
I grew up poor in a poor place, but had some "rich" friends whose future was running the family business or otherwise maintaining regionally dependent wealth. If they cashed out they'd be betraying another set of "rules": their family. Their day-to-day quality of life is still significantly worse than anyone upper middle class in a major metro area suburb. They have to deal with high property crime, corrupt local government, etc. Having to hide your wealth and not many peers can be just as stressful as being poor in the first place.
I think the way we relate to authority is a very central part of socialization for humans. We get it from our parents, and to some extent our peers. Best way to change it as a grownup is probably therapy.
Take a few risks. Start with risks that aren't real, like going to a restaurant that no one you know has ever heard of.
Once you have the experience that nothing bad happens, or if it does, it at most wasted a little money and time, work your way up to more rewarding risks.
Don't go as far as the Into the Wild guy though: he never realised how much "nothing bad" happening was due to other people bailing him out until he took risks someplace where that wasn't going to happen.
It's like writing a program: do it in small chunks and check each bit of functionality before committing.
No hacker ever stopped writing a program because they encountered bugs now and then.
You're not alone, and you have some good awareness.
If you're currently facing real resource threats, I guess your wiring might make it very difficult to develop more luxurious ambitions or passions. (Where someone else might actually retreat into denial, and cling to distractions from survival.)
But if you currently have resources and not under imminent existential threat, two naive suggestions:
* Consider finding a counselor (expensive), or doing lots of (frugal) Web searching about the topic, to try to figure out how to un-condition yourself from fixating on mere survival.
* For growing new ambitions and passions, have you tried experimenting, trying different things to see whether you'd like them, once you spend a significant chunk of time on them?
Also, FWIW, 10 years from now, you'll probably realize that you had more agency and options now than you currently think you do. Consider that bit of info from your future self.
The main blocking "poverty mentality" is focusing on getting by with what little you have, rather than focusing on producing more.
In generally, it's far easier to earn an extra Dollar than to save one from your budget, especially when you're poor. Working an extra hour is hard, but it's still easier than eating less rice and beans. Getting a job that pays more money is hard, but easier than reducing your rent from $600/mo to $550/mo.
The other mentality one has to break is the hopelessness, which is not at all helped by articles such as TFA here. Believing that past difficulties are inescapably holding you back robs you of the initiative, motivation and agency you could use to actually improve your life. The people who make it out of poverty are the ones who believe that their effort can improve their life.
> living like a "rat", is also very unappealing to potential love interests.
Yeah, women really dislike men with a poverty attitude who worry about spending money. Poor men who act as if they are rich seems to do much better than well off men who act as if they are poor.
You and I are the same age and from similar background... Just reading your post makes it sound like you have a little backwards (obviously I don't know your situation beyond what's written here.)
You mention "potential love interests" as the last thing but that's what it's actually about, isn't it? If you're not sure you want a family and partner then "living like a rat" is kinda fine - why not live that way if that's what you want?
On the other hand, if you want a family then start with that goal in mind - what has to change? If you need to upgrade your living situation so women aren't grossed out to come over, then you do that for that reason.
I don't think this has to do with "poverty mentality" specifically. Plenty of poor people make do with what they have and still date, get married, and have kids - because they want those things. When you really want those things, you shape your life to achieve them.
I know a few people living in the east who earns 1/5th of what I do and they're happy in their small garden growing tomatoes and potatoes, who am I to judge them and their poverty mindset.
Getting in line for the rat race most likely won't make you feel less of a rat.
Find your own pace, don't listen to random internet users about what poverty mentality is, or that taking risk is always good, or that being a wantrepreneur is the be all end all of life
Poverty mentality often mixes up with frugality in lifestyle, a certain disdain, discomfort, anxiety or even outright fear about living better than you "could" or "should", partly based on being afraid to lose what you purchased and feeling wasteful when purchasing something you previously considered an excess, indulgence.
> how does one unlearn "poverty mentality"?
Acquire things and then lose them, repeatedly. Literally throw money at the problem.
One can start with more expensive consumables and luxury items, as simple as food and wine (not to mention that more expensive quality produce more often than not means healthier diet), clothing (better fabrics feel nicer on skin, better fits make you look better and improve your public image if you care about it) and cosmetic items (bodily sensations are very important for mental health, who would've thought?).
Essentially you want to gradually get into "better" lifestyle and bigger spending just to show yourself it's not actually a problem, which in turn relaxes you towards seeking better opportunities and bigger earnings. Once you feel that spending more here and there can make you feel significantly better, something clicks in your monkey brain and changes your perception of what money can actually buy for you and why you would want to risk to get more of it, and that in turn changes your behavior. Just try to be self-aware about it and refrain from forbidding yourself to feel better because it's "unnecessary".
I grew up in a very poor socioeconomic situation and became an SWE. The largest challenge wasn't learning the skills. The hardest challenge was throwing away my culture and hiding who I am to get the bills paid. It was also knowing the "correct" socially-coded answers to things, and being able to keep up the upper-class disguise well-enough over long periods. When people discover or figure it out, they discriminate against you in subconscious ways and exclude you.
Values, the roots, are so different they bear different fruit. Learning the new fruit and reverse engineering its roots you become aware of what most never do. You are a fish that discovers water.
Scarcity and abundance are so different that unless you’ve experienced both you really will not understand.
Becoming a SWE changed all of this for me and I’ve noticed the culture, especially in FAANG is so wealthy.
I'm genuinely curious what things you feel like you have to hide. I'm fortunate enough to come from a decent socioeconomic situation, but I still feel like I'm not my "full self" (whatever that even means) at work in interest of team cohesion.
One of the biggest indicators to me, as someone who has navigated such lines before, is how comfortable co-workers are with waste. A co-worker who takes catered food home (without saying something like, "oh I have 3 growing teenagers" or something else to excuse it) is low-class. Do you keep the little sauce packets, napkins, disposable cutlery, etc. from take-out? Low class. Do you keep the pencils and notepads etc. from places? Low. Class. Also this causes you to need to have a place to store all these things, and now you fulfill the stereotype of a poor, messy person.
Minimalism, aka the confidence to be able to acquire anything you may need at the moment with resources always available to you, is a class indicator.
Pretty much everything. When people ask my opinion on anything, they don't want my opinion, they want an opinion from their class perspective. When they want to know how my holiday was, no they don't. When I am supposed to have visited my family from context (or it's weird if I didn't), yeah I did. I am not allowed to wear things people of my class find professional. I am not allowed to discuss what I really did on my time off (it was a punk show or something like this, probably).
This is not even getting into issues where a lot of people let actual class discrimination fly live in the office, overtly insult people from my background, or say things about being scared regarding being near section 8 people. I could go on for a long time.
SWEs are not a tier where people care about your class much if you have the skills, speak professionally, and appear professional. Just don't talk about yourself. "How are you?" "Good". Yes, no one cares about you or your problems, but that's just work.
If you are aiming for director positions, yea, it's different story. Pro-tip - it won't be enough to pretend, they are mostly all related or went to the same school, worked together before, etc. So acting the same won't help much either.
In other words, as a SWE, you are blowing this way out of proportion.
Yeah I don't know what these people are talking about. Some of the people I've met are as care free as it gets. Wonder if most of what people "experience" is imagined here.
This sounds familiar, but if you're masking to class up it's just gonna burn you out and alienate others.
If you feel that pressure just practice what you should for all people: empathy. Listen and ask questions before you speak. This goes with all crowds. Be curious and find the common ground first. Everyone has some, regardless of class.
Who you are is a software engineer that gets the bills paid. Why would it be a "disguise" to act like upper class and not a disguise to act like lower class? If you weren't upper class you could never pretend to be it over long periods.
Just face reality of who you are and have become. Your past is no more "the real you" than your present. You and me and everybody reading this grew up walking around in diapers, that doesn't mean that it is the "real us". It's just the past, it's gone, good bye.
The brutal reality is people tend to discriminate those in a different social class. It's nothing as blatant as Indian Caste, but it's reality. This goes both ways too, upper discriminating lower and vice versa, and it transcends cultures.
For a practical example, nearly every single Black man who succeed(ed) in America doesn't speak so-called "Negro English", they all speak "normal" English. President Obama is perhaps the most familiar example. I have no doubt at least some of this is them putting on an act to demonstrate they are in the same social class as their would-be peers.
And on the other side of that coin, lower class Black men generally disparage characteristics of the higher classes such as being educated and carrying yourself more formally.
For better or worse, if you want to join a different social class you have to put up some act to get your foot in the door. Otherwise you'll be kicked right out. It's brutally unfortunate, but humans (and all living beings in general) prefer those who are alike and disdain those who aren't.
Hell, the audience here should look at themselves in a mirror: White shirt upper-middle class discriminating the elite upper class and the commonly middle and lower classes is everywhere. Screw those MBAs, amirite? The problem is Joe over there doesn't understand tech, amirite?
It’s not a disguise. Think of it as time travel to 100 years ago. After you learn to fit in, the old part is alive and well in there still. You from both times in the same body and mind.
Why does this matter when your colleagues are now likely currently in the same strata as you?
I also grew up very poor and while I tried to hide that fact during university, it makes no sense to hide it from my colleagues because we’re all basically in the same position now.
A good SWE salary doesn't necessarily elevate you to the same strata anymore. Most of the programmers I work with have parents that supported them, especially monetarily. I myself, could not rely on either parent. Well-off parents can help you with a down payment on a house, be a better present grandparent, and be a reliable source of financial support in hard times. For most people in these well-paid positions, a job doesn't guarantee buying a house anymore, or a stable future. Only generational wealth does.
I grew up in a family who couldn't afford coffee so we drank roasted barley for years. But then we moved to the US and my family became middle class. I'm fairly well-off now, but I'm not sure if I was advantaged by being an immigrant or not.
Do you even want to keep company with people who would discriminate you for being poor? Seems thats actually a useful signal to who is worth giving time and energy towards in your own life. Screw them, in other words, rather than feel like you need to put on a mask to appease these terrible people. If you work for these types then either harden yourself to their opinions of you or find other people to work for who aren’t classist bigots.
Yeah, sadly, not a lot here. I’m a fan of studies around materialism and capitalism but trying to dress up a study in neuroscience as a cultural critique comes off as disingenuous and vapid
How exactly? If there were a hypothetical study that saw that people who have been homeless, even after homelessness, suffer from more diseases related to parasites, would it be "disingenuous and vapid?" Would it be trying to dress up a study in parasitology as cultural critique?
Or, alternatively, could both poverty and homelessness be related to culture?
I would argue btw that sub-saharan Africa was held back in terms of average IQ due to poor nutrition as well as the relative lack of empires for hundreds of years
There has been a raft of "research" over the last ~decade that purports to show that poverty causes stupidity. My impression (as a scientist, kinda related area) is that it's been discredited.
You must draw the distinction between correlational evidence (what this submission is doing) and causal claims, which is what most of the research you're pointing to makes.
TL;DR: Poverty doesn't cause lower intelligence. Catastrophically bad diet (to the point of stunting) will, though, in ref to your 2008 link. 2008 study is very weak and doesn't look at starvation, only correlational, they find a very small effect and it's very likely some unmeasured confounds.
I've noticed a lot of people from the middle of America who grew up lower middle class are stingy (even if they are doing well now). Small things like lowering the heating in their house to uncomfortable levels to save 10 bucks a month, not buying a round of drinks. etc
It's interesting because ppl in even worse socioeconomic situations in South Asia are the opposite and go above and beyond to be generous. I guess its because being hospitable is a big part of the culture there.
I'd be curious to see this corrected for sleep deprivation. In California, and so also Silicon Valley, the building codes for noise proofing apartment complexes are much weaker than for condos. This means that you're unlikely to be able to reliably sleep through the night if you live in an apartment.
For reference, noise proofing a ~ 2000 sq.ft. house in 2020 cost about $2K as it was being built, so it's hard to make an argument about housing affordability, etc. We've had bad luck with older buildings that were renovated into "luxury living" apartments and with older non-renovated buildings.
We never rented a unit in a newer building, so I can't comment about those. It's possible that developers just pay the equivalent of two weeks rent per unit now to make the buildings be less miserable.
My take (while sleep deprived) was that the situation was just a giant "f--k the poor" on the part of the people that wrote the building codes.
I’ve never really thought about this before, but it is obvious in hindsight. When I finally made enough money to move into a newer apartment, the noise from neighbors and outside was almost nonexistent. It was a stark contrast, but I never thought about how that affected my sleep/productivity, let alone how it would affect all apartment dwellers.
Its not even a sure bet new ones are like that. I’d guess you have cement walls. A lot of the new 5 story apartments are timber framed with cheap sheetrock.
More like fuck everyone not just the poor. New expensive condos and apartments are also built poorly like that.
That being said you do get used to hearing footsteps before long. As long as someone isn’t partying with a stereo you eventually tune out all that stuff in my experience although usually the first few days to weeks are rough sleeping in any new place.
Readit News
What can I afford to eat today? How am I gonna pay the electricity bill? How am I gonna fix my broken 20yo car? Which grocery has the cheapest diapers? Should I switch on the heating today or are there colder days coming this month?
If you are well off none of the above is even a thing.
Those things didn't cost more money (nobody had any) but they reflected the focus on getting their kids out of that situation. The kids whose parents thought this way in my hood are mainly in the 1% now. The kids whose parents didn't think this way have a by-and-large the same life their parents did.
I am not an expert but I do expect the epigenetics field of study to help us build a better understanding of the things touched on in this paper.
P.S. you do have a "point". Someone saying that you don't is a cop-out so they don't have to think about how to engage in a conversation, debate, or discourse.
This is why our current solutions are failing so badly, but telling people they are responsible for their children's outcomes does not get as many votes as telling them that the government is responsible. Just make sure to vote for us and we will fix all your problems!
Also, "poor" as you're using it here might be too broad a term. The amount of brain cycles that parents can spare for their kid's academic performance is inversely related to how much time they're worrying about food, whether or not the utilities will be shut off, how to work overtime and keep the kid safe, etc.
Interesting. But it’s worth noting that many different causal mechanisms can explain that data. For example it could be that parents that think that way are pretty smart and good at long-term planning / delayed gratification, and such traits are highly heritable. So kids inherit those traits and do well.
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This is comforting fantasy. One of the most dire statistics in the US is that black people consistently place more value on education and getting certifications than white people do, and that it doesn't help them (as a group) in the market at all. A black person with a college degree has about the same likelihood of being hired as a white high school graduate who has spent time in prison.
It's also a slander on the poor. You either think that fewer than one percent of the poor place value on education, or you think that class is so hypermobile that far more than one percent of the poor are ending up in the 1%. The idea that all the worthy poor automatically go to heaven is, with the slightest inspection, a statistical impossibility, unless you believe that the poor are almost never worthy.
edit: also, where the hell are these worthy poor parents coming from, and how did they manage to stay poor with so much virtue?
https://whatever.scalzi.com/2005/09/03/being-poor/
It's worth a read. And a re-read, come to think of it - I'll go do that now.
Many well-off people care about these things. They cook for themselves to save money, they monitor their electricity usage, buy reliable second hand cars, look at the diaper prices and wear warm clothes instead of overheating the space. Some of them do it even if they don't have to, making it a waste of their valuable time, but for those with low middle-class income, it is the difference between a rather good standard of living and poverty.
In fact, if you are really good at "dealing with your situation", chances are that you won't stay poor for long. Not only you will make the best of whatever income you have, but it is also a highly sought after skill, and you may up with a well paying job or a profitable business.
But it is usually a learned skill, and other poor people are unlikely to teach you, because they failed at it themselves, it is a vicious circle.
I call it "Poor Brain/Rich Brain", and neither requires you to be rich or poor, although they are heavily correlated. A Poor Brain person will always take the immediate reward, even if it's not crucial to their survival. They fail the marshmallow test [0]. Rich Brain people will weigh the immediate reward against future opportunities, even if the immediate reward would significantly enhance their life, and the future opportunity is vague and undefined. It's about understanding that how you are perceived in certain situations can far outweigh your own ability to change your circumstances.
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanford_marshmallow_experimen...
"A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush" accurately describes the experience of many people who grew up in poverty. It's a proverb for a reason.
You're talking about time preference. What you've decided to call "poor brain" is simply high time preference, and "rich brain" is low time preference.
There. Now you don't need to defend the implicit statistical correlation, or deal with those who are justly annoyed because it's unsupported and classist.
Then you misunderstand the metric by poor people.
If you eat the marshmallow now, you get a marshmallow.
If you wait, it WILL disappear. You don't get a marshmallow.
Basically, for poor people, the "future" is just future suffering, judgemental assholes in government cutting more funds cause you made $10 more this month (welfare cliff), and your sad equipment breaking down at the worst case causing whatever meager savings to evaporate like smoke.
I think being raised poor imbues you with the opposite mentality, that you will inevitably end up being broke. This has played out a few times in front of my eyes when friends from poor families come into a windfall and burn through it within a few months. It was like they subconsciously knew they would wind up broke again so why not?
To me an extra $100 is that much closer to a safe retirement. For them it’s 4 candles. Compromising on 2 candles has worked well for us.
“Poor people” cannot be lumped into a single group.
Some respond to their problems like you mention: they dwell on the scarcity and try to problem solve. I’m not convinced that group is the majority of poor (at least in developed countries).
There are many low income people who do not really worry or think about those things at all. They are incredibly reactive vs proactive and do not plan well. They don’t really worry about whether or not they can pay the electric bill—either they will pay it or they won’t.
A big one, I generally have disdain for status goods, probably because I couldn't have them as a kid so I convinced myself they don't matter. This one I'm not planning to fix :)
Or, I mechanically buy things I need on discount and optimize minor things like that without much mental effort. I have to train myself now to notice when I do make effort, so I don't waste time saving 5 bucks anymore.
Or a weird one, I am averse to buying anything that I cannot afford /very/ easily, I remember the first time I saved enough money from odd jobs and gifts to upgrade my computer (early aughts), I was deathly afraid to do it - cause if something happened to my years-old shitty computer I could use the money to buy a new one 3 times over, but if I spent the money now on the new one and something happened to it I'd be SOL, better stick with the old shitty computer. When having money, it translated into e.g. buying a house I could afford very easily ("the cheapest house on the best street", sorta) instead of maxing out like most people I know and buying as much house as practical... However in smaller things, I have to really force myself to spend money, e.g. to not buy crappy air tickets just cause they are a bit cheaper, and such.
Why cannot everyone get the good hangups from poverty? :)
Source: grew up in that situation.
Living in a large German city, I also never owned a car and didn't feel poor for the fact.
The concept of the poverty line is somewhat artificial but it avoids this sort of pointless digression.
It's easy to work 80 hours a week when you have people taking care of all of your other needs.
Somebody with a fairly normal job could, in principle (assuming employer allows it, opportunities exist, etc.), work 80 hours a week and spend their entire extra income on a full-time assistant for their daily chores. The more your hourly income is higher than the assistant's, the more economical that becomes. A FAANG level programmer could absolutely do that, but they typically don't, probably because it's not easy!
You don't even need an assistant if you have no kids, live walking distance from work, and get all your meals by eating out/delivery. You won't have much housework because you won't spend much time there.
Having grown up lower middle class with parents from a former Eastern bloc country, I feel that my mentality has very often held me back from taking risks in career, education and personal life, because there was no safety net to fall back on if the risky move wouldn't pay off.
I'm good at surviving with very little money or food, but at the age of 42, I feel now like I had let life pass me by, having never developed ambitions or passions, and living like a "rat", is also very unappealing to potential love interests.
For the longest time I never bought anything for myself. I had half a million in income and wouldn't even buy a snack or anything because it felt "wrong" the same way I couldn't justify it when I was a kid.
Before I was married I didn't even own a bed (I coded on a lawn chair in my apartment and used a cardboard box for my table. I didn't own a TV, car, etc.
Even though I build things for my livelihood, I couldn't justify buying a new machine, etc.
I started to come out of that mindset after getting married. I enjoyed buying things for others (my spouse, then my kids). My spouse then urged (forced) me to buy things for myself. Come to think of it, maybe I never grew out of that mindset. If I wasn't married I would still be living that way. The only reason I'm not is because my wife urges (forces) me not to.
Err, get married?
>> For the longest time I never bought anything for myself.
For many, the "poor mindset" is to spend every dime you get, often to buy frivolous things
It takes actual time to learn to spend, and you gotta be patient with yourself.
I worked for years while sleeping on the floor (on a bedsheet, over carpet), even once I could arguably afford a bed. It took a girlfriend to convince me that I should finally, urgently buy a bed (well, an unfinished pine futon frame, from a warehouse outlet).
Maybe the current pause in VC-powered-growth startups means founders&engineers with latent frugality skills will really shine? :)
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It seems to me that one aspect of "poverty mentality" is a refusal to go outside of "the rules" even when doing so would clearly be within the socially acceptable gray area. I'm not talking about someone with privilege selfishly believing that the rules don't apply to them. I mean minor things like putting up a lost cat flier without a permit, ducking into a random restaurant and asking if they have napkins to clean up a spill, or teaching a small yoga class in a public park without a permit. The fear seems to be that if those in authority are given any opportunity to crack down or refuse a request then they will do so.
What I have noticed is that it actually does seem like those in authority are more strict with them than they are for me (note that in this case I'm talking about people who are the same race and in some cases the same gender as me).
I've come to suspect that in addition to "poverty mindset", there may also be some sort of unconscious body language or other indicators that allow people to subconsciously pickup that someone comes from poverty. I don't have any proof of this, it's just something that I've suspected. So I don't know if there would be any value in trying to look at any of these potential cues?
It is also trivially true that poor people are more likely to commit crimes (source[1] if needed, though). Of course, that is likely biased by the selective enforcement you call out.
Perhaps the two can be rectified as a bimodal distribution: Poor people are either dramatically more or dramatically less likely to commit crimes based on how they respond to their environment. Say poor people are more likely to be exposed to crime and thus presented with the choice, and you can respond to high scrutiny by treading carefully or just giving up on it and doing whatever ("They'll punish me regardless, may as well get something out of it.").
Because getting convicted of a given crime is relatively unlikely to begin with, the low crime group doesn't substantively reduce the conviction rate but the high crime group drives it up dramatically. And I am more able to notice the guy blasting bass at 80 mph than the hundreds who quietly pass by.
[1]https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4180846/
Oh, people don't develop fear of authority for no reason. It's way more likely that you do not see the times society is more strict with them.
The fear is still valid regardless of their race, ethnicity, gender, etc. if they didn't move away from the poverty. Most do move away, but not all can.
I grew up poor in a poor place, but had some "rich" friends whose future was running the family business or otherwise maintaining regionally dependent wealth. If they cashed out they'd be betraying another set of "rules": their family. Their day-to-day quality of life is still significantly worse than anyone upper middle class in a major metro area suburb. They have to deal with high property crime, corrupt local government, etc. Having to hide your wealth and not many peers can be just as stressful as being poor in the first place.
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Take a few risks. Start with risks that aren't real, like going to a restaurant that no one you know has ever heard of.
Once you have the experience that nothing bad happens, or if it does, it at most wasted a little money and time, work your way up to more rewarding risks.
Don't go as far as the Into the Wild guy though: he never realised how much "nothing bad" happening was due to other people bailing him out until he took risks someplace where that wasn't going to happen.
It's like writing a program: do it in small chunks and check each bit of functionality before committing.
No hacker ever stopped writing a program because they encountered bugs now and then.
Does this make sense?
If you're currently facing real resource threats, I guess your wiring might make it very difficult to develop more luxurious ambitions or passions. (Where someone else might actually retreat into denial, and cling to distractions from survival.)
But if you currently have resources and not under imminent existential threat, two naive suggestions:
* Consider finding a counselor (expensive), or doing lots of (frugal) Web searching about the topic, to try to figure out how to un-condition yourself from fixating on mere survival.
* For growing new ambitions and passions, have you tried experimenting, trying different things to see whether you'd like them, once you spend a significant chunk of time on them?
Also, FWIW, 10 years from now, you'll probably realize that you had more agency and options now than you currently think you do. Consider that bit of info from your future self.
In generally, it's far easier to earn an extra Dollar than to save one from your budget, especially when you're poor. Working an extra hour is hard, but it's still easier than eating less rice and beans. Getting a job that pays more money is hard, but easier than reducing your rent from $600/mo to $550/mo.
The other mentality one has to break is the hopelessness, which is not at all helped by articles such as TFA here. Believing that past difficulties are inescapably holding you back robs you of the initiative, motivation and agency you could use to actually improve your life. The people who make it out of poverty are the ones who believe that their effort can improve their life.
Yeah, women really dislike men with a poverty attitude who worry about spending money. Poor men who act as if they are rich seems to do much better than well off men who act as if they are poor.
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You mention "potential love interests" as the last thing but that's what it's actually about, isn't it? If you're not sure you want a family and partner then "living like a rat" is kinda fine - why not live that way if that's what you want?
On the other hand, if you want a family then start with that goal in mind - what has to change? If you need to upgrade your living situation so women aren't grossed out to come over, then you do that for that reason.
I don't think this has to do with "poverty mentality" specifically. Plenty of poor people make do with what they have and still date, get married, and have kids - because they want those things. When you really want those things, you shape your life to achieve them.
Getting in line for the rat race most likely won't make you feel less of a rat.
Find your own pace, don't listen to random internet users about what poverty mentality is, or that taking risk is always good, or that being a wantrepreneur is the be all end all of life
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Move sideways a step or two at a time. Test the ground before you plant your foot.
> how does one unlearn "poverty mentality"?
Acquire things and then lose them, repeatedly. Literally throw money at the problem.
One can start with more expensive consumables and luxury items, as simple as food and wine (not to mention that more expensive quality produce more often than not means healthier diet), clothing (better fabrics feel nicer on skin, better fits make you look better and improve your public image if you care about it) and cosmetic items (bodily sensations are very important for mental health, who would've thought?).
Essentially you want to gradually get into "better" lifestyle and bigger spending just to show yourself it's not actually a problem, which in turn relaxes you towards seeking better opportunities and bigger earnings. Once you feel that spending more here and there can make you feel significantly better, something clicks in your monkey brain and changes your perception of what money can actually buy for you and why you would want to risk to get more of it, and that in turn changes your behavior. Just try to be self-aware about it and refrain from forbidding yourself to feel better because it's "unnecessary".
not sure about that, caviar, marbled steaks and fine wine would probably lose to cabbage, carrots and tap water in the health department.
Values, the roots, are so different they bear different fruit. Learning the new fruit and reverse engineering its roots you become aware of what most never do. You are a fish that discovers water.
Scarcity and abundance are so different that unless you’ve experienced both you really will not understand.
Becoming a SWE changed all of this for me and I’ve noticed the culture, especially in FAANG is so wealthy.
Minimalism, aka the confidence to be able to acquire anything you may need at the moment with resources always available to you, is a class indicator.
This is not even getting into issues where a lot of people let actual class discrimination fly live in the office, overtly insult people from my background, or say things about being scared regarding being near section 8 people. I could go on for a long time.
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If you are aiming for director positions, yea, it's different story. Pro-tip - it won't be enough to pretend, they are mostly all related or went to the same school, worked together before, etc. So acting the same won't help much either.
In other words, as a SWE, you are blowing this way out of proportion.
If you feel that pressure just practice what you should for all people: empathy. Listen and ask questions before you speak. This goes with all crowds. Be curious and find the common ground first. Everyone has some, regardless of class.
Who you are is a software engineer that gets the bills paid. Why would it be a "disguise" to act like upper class and not a disguise to act like lower class? If you weren't upper class you could never pretend to be it over long periods.
Just face reality of who you are and have become. Your past is no more "the real you" than your present. You and me and everybody reading this grew up walking around in diapers, that doesn't mean that it is the "real us". It's just the past, it's gone, good bye.
For a practical example, nearly every single Black man who succeed(ed) in America doesn't speak so-called "Negro English", they all speak "normal" English. President Obama is perhaps the most familiar example. I have no doubt at least some of this is them putting on an act to demonstrate they are in the same social class as their would-be peers.
And on the other side of that coin, lower class Black men generally disparage characteristics of the higher classes such as being educated and carrying yourself more formally.
For better or worse, if you want to join a different social class you have to put up some act to get your foot in the door. Otherwise you'll be kicked right out. It's brutally unfortunate, but humans (and all living beings in general) prefer those who are alike and disdain those who aren't.
Hell, the audience here should look at themselves in a mirror: White shirt upper-middle class discriminating the elite upper class and the commonly middle and lower classes is everywhere. Screw those MBAs, amirite? The problem is Joe over there doesn't understand tech, amirite?
I also grew up very poor and while I tried to hide that fact during university, it makes no sense to hide it from my colleagues because we’re all basically in the same position now.
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Or, alternatively, could both poverty and homelessness be related to culture?
2018: https://www.pbs.org/newshour/economy/making-sense/analysis-h...
2013: https://www.businessinsider.com/poverty-effect-on-intelligen...
2008: https://jech.bmj.com/content/66/7/624 (diet)
I would argue btw that sub-saharan Africa was held back in terms of average IQ due to poor nutrition as well as the relative lack of empires for hundreds of years
You must draw the distinction between correlational evidence (what this submission is doing) and causal claims, which is what most of the research you're pointing to makes.
TL;DR: Poverty doesn't cause lower intelligence. Catastrophically bad diet (to the point of stunting) will, though, in ref to your 2008 link. 2008 study is very weak and doesn't look at starvation, only correlational, they find a very small effect and it's very likely some unmeasured confounds.
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It's interesting because ppl in even worse socioeconomic situations in South Asia are the opposite and go above and beyond to be generous. I guess its because being hospitable is a big part of the culture there.
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For reference, noise proofing a ~ 2000 sq.ft. house in 2020 cost about $2K as it was being built, so it's hard to make an argument about housing affordability, etc. We've had bad luck with older buildings that were renovated into "luxury living" apartments and with older non-renovated buildings.
We never rented a unit in a newer building, so I can't comment about those. It's possible that developers just pay the equivalent of two weeks rent per unit now to make the buildings be less miserable.
My take (while sleep deprived) was that the situation was just a giant "f--k the poor" on the part of the people that wrote the building codes.
That being said you do get used to hearing footsteps before long. As long as someone isn’t partying with a stereo you eventually tune out all that stuff in my experience although usually the first few days to weeks are rough sleeping in any new place.
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