"100% of people who do not save money do not have any!"--Dave Ramsey

[All Darc]

American's home don't use to have a water reservoir (on Brazil called water box and installed on roof). So when some huge trouble happens, like in New Orleans after the huricane, people get without water even for drink. Potable water it's a primary need and the lack of it can conflicts.

Who here have a water tank on home?
I think it's a wise investment.

Other I was watching a vide abouth the myths of right anf left wing. They showed that in USA therte is no really poor people, unless if we take the homeless on most palces. Since even people with lower salaries have a home, water?electricity, a TV, most have a car or air conditiopned. I some cities and states they gave some help to homeless people o for who lost job and home, gace some money and a small compact residence, to cope with the very basic needs, shelter and food.
Even homeless don't get hungry.

USA don't know really poor people.

[darcane]

Originally Posted by redpoint5

If I found myself single, my first move would be to get roommates. Heck, the first 3 years of marriage we had roommates... and recently a friend of my wife is staying rent-free while she looks for work. I'm tempted to rent out rooms again; it's always worked out well for me, but then again I like people and get along well since I don't let little things get under my skin.

Well, I have two "roommates". They are both unemployed and the gov't (specifically C.P.S.) comes after me if I try to kick them out or don't feed them.

[darcane]

Originally Posted by redpoint5

I specifically avoided WOW knowing I wouldn't have the willpower to set proper boundaries. For years that was half the conversation in the office. One coworker told me how much he played (WOW keeps track of it for you), and it worked out to 8hrs per day, every day. That means on days he didn't play at all, he made up for by playing more than 8hrs on other days. He also worked 40hrs, and presumably slept somewhere around 56hrs... that leaves 16hrs to do everything else. He shared this with me after I was skeptical that his character had a street value of $500. Most I'd had ever paid for a video game up until then was probably $40. The concept of a subscription to play was newish then.

I've spent thousands of hours playing games though. Too soon to tell if I regret it; many of my memories playing are quite fond still.

You'll notice I said nothing about reducing WOW spending. It goes along with my principle of spending money where you enjoy it most (as long as other financial responsibilities are met).

I played Asheron's Call for about a year. That was enough for me to figure out that MMORPGs are too much of a time sink for me, and I refused to play any after that. I ended up selling my account for about $120, which was about what I had in subscription fees.

I still play video games, but only casually. It's a fun way to connect with my 10 year old son who loves vintage gaming systems. And it's relatively cheap entertainment. His Halloween costume this year: Shy Guy!

[Shaneajanderson]

Originally Posted by All Darc

American's home don't use to have a water reservoir (on Brazil called water box and installed on roof). So when some huge trouble happens, like in New Orleans after the huricane, people get without water even for drink. Potable water it's a primary need and the lack of it can conflicts.

Who here have a water tank on home?
I think it's a wise investment.

Other I was watching a vide abouth the myths of right anf left wing. They showed that in USA therte is no really poor people, unless if we take the homeless on most palces. Since even people with lower salaries have a home, water?electricity, a TV, most have a car or air conditiopned. I some cities and states they gave some help to homeless people o for who lost job and home, gace some money and a small compact residence, to cope with the very basic needs, shelter and food.
Even homeless don't get hungry.

USA don't know really poor people.

You are correct here in all points, Americans are very fortunate (spoiled?)

Emergency water storage is a great idea, and I intend to do some in my new house, can't where I am now. We also try to keep a couple weeks supply of food on hand in case we can't get out or something happens: where I live it's not uncommon to get trapped in town for a week because of a blizzard, and while I could drive across town the the local grocery store, the prices locally are 3-4X what they are in Fargo just 50 miles away; preparedness saves you money too.

I've read before that an American making minimum wage today is more wealthy than over 99% of people throughout history, and more wealthy than many many people alive today. People here can have a decent apartment, a running car, and a smart phone from a minimum wage job, if they know how to budget a little.

[litesong]

Originally Posted by Shaneajanderson

People here can have a decent apartment, a running car, and a smart phone from a minimum wage job, if they know how to budget a little.

You can see that Shaneajanderson is a re-pub-lick-un complaining about the democrat's min. wage.
Even on a democrat's min. wage, the "apartment" is one room, the vehicle can never break-down, the kids are forbidden to get sick (hard to do while starving), the boss can never fire min. wage workers & the parents have to work to age, 90.
It is obvious that if we discuss the re-pubic-lick-un min. wage, Shaneajanderson isn't telling the truth.

[redpoint5]

People don't have the right to live in a private apartment; it isn't a "need". We tend to view our current standard of living as being the "minimum", or close to it, that people should be entitled to.

I lived in a 1996 Subaru Legacy for nearly 2 years, not out of necessity, but out of lack of need for a large living space as I was new to the workforce and worked 13hr shifts. I wasn't going to spend $800/mo so I could shut my eyes for 7hrs every night. 80% of my $17/hr wage was going into savings, and I quickly amassed years worth of living expenses. I could have maintained my standard of living, which was great, on $3/hr.

So when I say that some arbitrary and evil minimum wage is arbitrary and evil, I'm mindful of the fact that I'm willing to live under the lowest of wages that I agree to, and that nobody has the right to dictate the terms under which I'm willing to work, because they don't have ownership of my body or labor.

Besides all that, minimum wage jobs aren't designed to be "living" wages, they are designed to give people new to the workforce (high schoolers, immigrants, etc) a starting point.

[Xist]

When they successfully pushed to increase the minimum wage in Arizona, they kept showing and talking about single minority mothers with kids, even though most people earning the minimum wage are 25 or less, without kids, and living with their parents.

People kept telling me they would happily support the 75% of people that did not need the raise in order to help the 25% who had kids, but no job skills.

That is their decision. I want people to get job skills.

This seems to support much of what I just wrote: https://www.bls.gov/opub/reports/min.../2017/home.htm

[redpoint5]

Single mothers with low income earning potential is a separate matter altogether and should be addressed separately from the question of who has a say in negotiating labor contracts.

McDonalds is already testing the replacements for many of their minimum wage workers by installing kiosks and rolling out mobile apps so that customers place their own orders rather than consume the increasingly costly time of employees. In other words, you artificially make certain jobs too expensive, and the motivation to eliminate them altogether reaches a tipping point.

Raising minimum wage is a job killing and inflation increasing move, and nothing else (oh, some short-term feel-goods, for whatever that's worth).

[Xist]

"Restaurants should pay 40% more, but managers and owners are too greedy!"
"According to Chron.com, the average net profit margin for all S&P 500 companies is a little over 8 percent."
"That's not true at all!"
"What is your source?"
"I don't need a source! I know!"
"Can we stop talking?"
"I was going to say that."

[Fat Charlie]

Of course, profits for a large corporation are what they let the shareholders have after they're done paying for their corporate jets, management v̶a̶c̶a̶t̶i̶o̶n̶s̶ conferences and NFL tickets.