this post was submitted on 11 Dec 2023
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How poor is the average American? (lemmy.ml)
submitted 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) by Kushia@lemmy.ml to c/asklemmy@lemmy.ml
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I've been watching a few American TV shows and it blows my mind that they put up with such atrocious working terms and conditions.

One show was about a removal company where any damage at all, even not the workers fault, is taken out of their tips. There's no insurance from the multimillion dollar business. As they're not paid a living wage the guy on the show had examples of when he and his family went weeks with barely any income and this was considered normal?!

Another example was a cooking show where the prize was tickets to an NFL game. The lady who won explained that she'd be waiting in the car so her sons could experience their first live game, because she couldn't otherwise afford a ticket to go. They give tickets for football games away for free to people where I live for no reason at all..

Yet another example was where the workers got a $5k tip from their company and the reactions were as if this amount of money was even remotely life changing. It saddens me to think the average Americans life could be made so much better with such a relatively small amount of money and they don't unionize and demand far better. The company in question was on track to make a billion bloody dollars while their workers are on the poverty line and don't even have all their teeth?

It's not actually this bad and the average American lives a pretty good life like we're led to believe, right?

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[โ€“] scoobford@lemmy.ml 24 points 10 months ago (3 children)

Tl;Dr: It varies very drastically by locale. Rural Americans can often live okay on "very* minimal income. Standards on what " poor" and "normal" vary about as widely between parts of America as they do between America and where you're from.

Where I live (Dallas), I'm making around $40,000 in an area where the median is $60,000. I live alone, but I will have to buy a new car this year and I will barely be able to make my payments. I do not have a college degree, and I'm still basically entry level.

I've been looking at moving a lot recently. If I moved where I want to live (Oregon), I'd probably make the same or slightly less money, and my rent and expenses would probably rise by a few hundred a month. In effect, I would barely be getting by if I didn't have a car payment.

I've also been looking at Chicago, where the median wage is slightly less than I make now, but cost of living is slightly lower, and I'd make slightly more. I also wouldn't have to have a car, so my disposable income would rise drastically.

[โ€“] Valmond@lemmy.mindoki.com 6 points 10 months ago (2 children)

Would you consider a solid used car?

In France you can cet a half crappy car for some grands, in Sweden, where I come from, 10k will get you a Volvo rolling another 300.000 kilometers.

The USA is such a curious (for me sort of imaginary even) place. We've been fed USA & USSR and onwards (easy to say the USA was heavily on the win side for teenagers, USSR showed off cool things too for a young mind like heavy tech starship and devastating nuclear power etc. The USA always gave the vibe about "be what you want" though, I'm a big fan :-). How do you deal with the fired at will thing when you get old for example? Is your thirties some sort of retirement hunting time? OPs question sure is interesting for us Europeans I guess(I feel things vary wildly in the EU already! Like retirement in Italy is very personal, in Sweden it isn't).

Gotta go mix the soup, cheers!

[โ€“] scoobford@lemmy.one 3 points 10 months ago (1 children)

The car I'm interested in holds its value very well, so the lifetime cost is lower if I buy new. I'm also planning on being slightly less poor before buying it.

And regarding the "fired at will" thing, we don't deal with it. We just kind of hope. I'm a little bit tistic, so I've been fired several times for not engaging in the proper amount of small talk. You get another job and move on.

[โ€“] MomoTimeToDie@sh.itjust.works -3 points 10 months ago

How do you deal with the fired at will thing when you get old for example?

I mean the most basic answer is that it really isn't a problem unless you create one. Even at the most bottom of the barrel jobs, it's still more expensive for the employer to hire and train a new employee than to just keep a current one. This is even more relevant for positions people would consider a "career". So it's no like people are just being fired at random or something.

[โ€“] octobob@lemmy.ml 5 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Dog if you're thinking about moving, come to the best small-town vines rust belt city that has the lowest cost of living in the US, where I was born and raised, Pittsburgh. I love this city to death and it has deep working class roots. I bought an 1800 sq ft, 4 bedroom home that was built in 1890 for $160k in 2020. I've been renovating it for the past few years and still got a ways to go but it's coming together beautifully.

For what it's worth, our rent is still well below the national average, and I love this city to death. It's small, but not too small, but not too large, everybody seems to know everybody, and there's always always something to do. The geography and nature and rivers really forced this city's hand a few hundred years ago where now everything is just built around and into mountainsides and deep woods, highways and roads and everything is a snarling maze of studio Ghibli elden ring on ketamine and I wouldn't want it any other way

[โ€“] steven@infosec.pub 2 points 10 months ago

Maybe you and Dog can become friends ๐Ÿฅน

[โ€“] AsheHole@lemmy.world 1 points 10 months ago

Fair warning with Chicago, it may look cheaper but taxes are much higher than Dallas, along with everything in general. Not trying to sway you, it's a gorgeous city. But, the L has been kinda crappy the past couple years and the winters will be a drastic change taking public transit. There's tons of job opportunities and plenty of ways to go cheaper here, so I recommend it if you think it would work for you, but plan for it to be more expensive than you think.