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How poor is the average American? (lemmy.ml)

submitted 11 months ago* (last edited 11 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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[–] scoobford@lemmy.ml 24 points 11 months ago (7 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.

[–] octobob@lemmy.ml 5 points 11 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

[–] steven@infosec.pub 2 points 11 months ago

Maybe you and Dog can become friends 🥹

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