Comment by l0c0b0x
2 years ago
I was Alex (my name is not Alex). Graduated high school in 97, but with a 2.1 GPA (yeah, pretty bad). Went to community college while working part time, living in a 'separated' household (mom/dad did the splits), supported both my parents both emotionally and financially (as much as I could) through their transition and new living arrangements. We were all immigrants, and still learning the ropes in this wonderful country. I did not graduate college, but instead went the part-time/apprenticeship/gain-experience route, while going through many roles. My baseline was to be a good citizen. A good son, a good partner, good friend, good husband and a good dad (4 wonderful kids). There were many good times, but also sad times, including when we lost our house and cars (2008), and that month when we literally didn't have money for food... but this country gives you many opportunities. There are safety nets, use them! You just have to focus on the goal: Move forward! There is always someone else who needs more help than you. Stay the course, and try not to lose perspective.
I'm one of the luckiest people alive because I live in this country, and was always able to surround myself with supportive, positive and forward thinkers.
I don't know why I shared this. Maybe because I don't care to blame society for my adverse experiences. Through those experiences, I learned to lead. I learned to listen. I learned to value and appreciate. I learned to live.
I guess what we learn from this is that not everyone is as enterprising as you? While on some level I’d say that, of course you can do it if you want to. There’s many people for whom that is just too much of a leap, and it feels unfair to say they don’t deserve happiness just because they can’t make themselves seek it.
> unfair to say they don’t deserve happiness just because they can’t make themselves seek it.
You and I have very different ideas about what's fair.
Really? Do you think it's fair that some kids will be able to command historic levels of political and capital power by being born and never need to work, most kids will need to work at this point it seems until death, some kids will achieve "needing to work until death" status by working harder than anyone else while being hungry and housing insecure, and many kids will simply live and die in squalor whether they work or not?
Considering we seem to be discussing the USA, the richest nation in human history, this seems very unfair to me. It seems to me at minimum we should easily be able to remove squalor conditions no matter how little someone works.
2 replies →
> it feels unfair to say they don’t deserve happiness just because they can’t make themselves seek it
While I’d agree, you’ve read the OP’s comment in a significantly darker light than I did, or than I can get the text to support
Ah, I wasn’t necessarily trying to imply anything about OP’s post.
Just that what worked for him might not work for many others. I’m still happy to hear he did ;)
5 replies →
OP sounds too servile to appreciate the hatred we have for Horatio Alger.
yeah, I mean, I made it (what was it?) I think I became conscious and awake at 16, and with a computer did anything imaginable. We have all became 10x with the internet, and will probably be 100x with AI.
[flagged]
The whole point of this study is to show that a well off person can do the bare minimum and a disadvantaged person could be doing way more than minimum, and the disadvantaged person will end up being disparaged as must have been doing the bare minimum.
It's as if you're responding to a different comment than the OP. GP talks about dealing with many years of hardship, no food, losing their house and car, and so on. Tolerating that and coming out stronger doesn't seem like doing "the bare minimum" to me.
Thank you for saying this. I spent a few years living outside the USA and it helped me deeply understand the positivity and opportunity life in USA can offer. It’s a special thing and I hope we can keep it that way for many decades to come
Are you talking about USA? What safety nets are available in the US?
P.S. It's just a question. Not everyone lives in the US. Heck, maybe the OP was even talking about another country, say Denmark.
Rather than looking at USA as Scandinavian county, imagine living in some of the counties in the global south. The competition for good jobs is so intense that you’ll work 10 hours a day, 6 days a week. You won’t miss work if you’re sick or have a family event because then somebody else gets your job. Culturally second chances don’t exist, and you’re the only chance your children have to get through school (because you have to pay for it) and for your parents to retire in peace (because they live with you and you care for them). Heaven forbid you get sick. There’s barely a regulatory system for doctors. The doctor takes your temperature but wasn’t trained to sanitize the thermometer correctly. You are now double sick and don’t have somewhere safe to isolate because your rented home has 2 rooms and no ability to ventilate. Your family is now sick, and your children’s school has no mercy for missing class. The children have to compete in complicated exams to even have the sliver of a chance to land themselves in a good university. Otherwise, they’re just gonna live in your footsteps. Oh and don’t take out a loan, because when you do and somehow your entire contact list lands in your lenders hands, every contact on the list will hear about your debt for the next several months.
I’m just demonstrating here but this is an example of the stressful life many people around the world are living. We are blessed to be in the USA.
Which countries in the "global south" are you talking about? I live in South America and life is not like this. Like, nothing at all like this; you might as well be describing Narnia or Middle Earth and it would sound just as fantastical.
Just as some examples:
Doctors are quite good here, none of that untrained nonsense you mentioned.
You have safety nets.
If you work formally employed (which granted is not a minor detail, since informal employment is a big problem), you have plenty of sick days, and these are mandated by law; so not at the mercy of the company.
Vacations are mandated by law to be paid according to how long you've been at the company. Nobody can fire you for taking vacations; it's about 2 weeks vacation once you've been working for a year. This is by law, the company is of course free to sweeten the deal.
Our best university is public and free.
While life is not easy for somebody without a family to support them or a good job, the reality is nowhere close to what you imagined.
Now, this is one country and I'm aware the "global south" is large and varied. I'm sure other countries have it worse. But it makes me suspect your global description of the south.
Etc, etc.
1 reply →
There are no doubt way worse places than the US.
I was under the impressions that Americans work hard too. For example, if I'm not mistaking there's no mandated minimum number of vacation days, so you might get only 11 compared to 20 in most European countries.
> Heaven forbid you get sick.
The medical act is (very) good in the US, but is it affordable?
> The children have to compete in complicated exams to even have the sliver of a chance to land themselves in a good university.
Doesn't the same apply to the US as well? You either have lots of money, or good grades or you're good athlete.
4 replies →
> The competition for good jobs is so intense that you’ll work 10 hours a day, 6 days a week. You won’t miss work if you’re sick or have a family event because then somebody else gets your job. Culturally second chances don’t exist, and you’re the only chance your children have to get through school (because you have to pay for it) and for your parents to retire in peace (because they live with you and you care for them). Heaven forbid you get sick.
I'll be honest, as a non-American, I thought you were describing the USA in these sentences. I quite frequently read things online/see videos etc where Americans are shocked that we can take several weeks or a month off for a holiday in Europe, that if we're sick we just take time off, there's no worry about being fired for getting sick, or needing to work in order to qualify for health insurance. Education isn't free everywhere, but in most places people acquire much less debt than it seems you do in the USA.
It doesn't shock me that there's anti-US propaganda. It shocks me that people on this site routinely fall for it.
I think it’s more that we routinely see very poor and mentally ill people in the US get zero support?
It’s not a great stretch to go from there to assume they don’t have any social security at all.
If it’s available but many people cannot or do not know to make use of it, is it really social security? If they do make use of it and it’s still not enough, does that change things?
5 replies →
You believe yourself to have a proper understanding of what's what with the United States? If so, I'd be quite interested in hearing how you went about acquiring an accurate model.
Earned Income Tax Credit, Supplemental Security Income, Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, the Child Care and Development Fund, housing assistance, Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program, Medicaid and Children’s Health Insurance Program, Special Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program for Women, Infants and Children
Those safety nets have huge gaps. The government doesn't want to be accused of harboring freeloaders (or, perhaps more accurately, a significant chunk of the population would rather people be homeless than a few "welfare queens" be permitted to cheat the system), so many who are genuinely in need can't get it.
16 replies →
The US in fact has a gigantic welfare state support system. The US spends more of its GDP on social welfare than either Canada or Australia, and we spend it poorly unfortunately (our return on investment is not great, we spend too much for too weak of results, as with healthcare).
To add to your list: housing, healthcare, food programs exist at the local + state + federal levels. The US state government system is huge unto itself, like having an entire other federal government nearly.
There are thousands of government support programs between the state + federal levels of government.
People outside of the US are almost entirely ignorant of how large the government systems in the US are. They're not as big as in France or Denmark obviously, they are still sizable compared to the median peer nation (on a GDP % basis).
1 reply →
Also all the non governmental safety nets. Food banks, charities, mutual aid networks, shelters and religious orgs.
Your story rubs me the wrong way. For one, you say you had to financially support your parents, but then insinuate that people highlighted in the article should bootstrap themselves up since America is such a great place. Also being an immigrant doesn't make it 'high risk.' In many areas, belonging to an immigrant community might actually confer an advantage.
The point of the article is to think about how adverse childhood experiences might affect adulthood, using actual data, and try to think about an actionable way to address the issue. Maybe stuff like this is behind USA's secret sauce compared to other countries where the 'unfortunate' are left to rot.
Not implying anything regarding OPs comment other than perspectives is greatly influenced by where you come from.
From: https://collabfund.com/blog/immutable-truths-and-arguing-foo...
> This is so foreign to the world I know. But so is my world to them. I think they’re wrong, but they’d say the same to me. I’m sure I’m right; so are they. Often the reason debates arise is that you double down on your view after learning that opposing views exist.
> Here’s another.
> Former New York Times columnist David Pogue once did a story about harsh working conditions at Foxconn tech assembly factories in China. A reader sent him a response:
>> My aunt worked several years in what Americans call “sweat shops.” It was hard work. Long hours, “small” wage, “poor” working conditions. Do you know what my aunt did before she worked in one of these factories? She was a prostitute.
>> Circumstances of birth are unfortunately random, and she was born in a very rural region. Most jobs were agricultural and family owned, and most of the jobs were held by men. Women and young girls, because of lack of educational and economic opportunities, had to find other “employment.”
>> The idea of working in a “sweat shop” compared to that old lifestyle is an improvement, in my opinion. I know that my aunt would rather be “exploited” by an evil capitalist boss for a couple of dollars than have her body be exploited by several men for pennies.
>> That is why I am upset by many Americans’ thinking. We do not have the same opportunities as the West. Our governmental infrastructure is different. The country is different.
>> Yes, factory is hard labor. Could it be better? Yes, but only when you compare such to American jobs.
>> If Americans truly care about Asian welfare, they would know that shutting down “sweat shops” would force many of us to return to rural regions and return to truly despicable “jobs.” And I fear that forcing factories to pay higher wages would mean they hire FEWER workers, not more.
This is an interesting perspective that I very much agree with (also being an immigrant), I feel there is this constant bashing on the country, and for what I can tell (at least in my circle), is citizens most of the time. I have found the US to be the easiest place to make it (and by far) of any other that I have been to, but they rather remove any ounce of responsibility from their own citizens for... their own doing.
> I have found the US to be the easiest place to make it (and by far) of any other that I have been to, but they rather remove any ounce of responsibility from their own citizens
I'm willing to bet - dollars to donuts - that there were (and are) American investors in your country of origin, and every other one you've been to. Sometimes being an outsider confers clarity / skills / experience necessary to exploit opportunities not available - or even visible to those who've lived all their lives in an environment.
While you may be right, I feel the dynamic is more about the fact that most expats tend to be more educated than the average. If someone willingly moved to a country where limited opportunity exists, that may not apply to them since they're better equipped for it.
This is especially true if you consider Indians or Chinese in America. Those populations have an even more acute education lead. So many people want to come here, that to commit means accepting you spend the next 15 or so years waiting in line to finally be a permanent resident (rather than an immigrant who can easily be forced to leave if their visa doesn't have a sponsor.)
3 replies →
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Original_position
That's great, and I'm genuinely glad to hear you've done well, but your story in no way negates the data in the article. It's not claiming that nobody coming from an adverse childhood succeeeds - just that it's a lot harder. Your post is a great example of survivorship bias. I doubt that there are many people in poverty who post to HN.
Well of course no, there us simply no logical way how that could work, and claim what you (not you personally) can, reality and society are at base level quite logical, even if obscure way.
If you start life race very far behind athletes who had best training and nutrition, how easily you can even catch them, not even going into overcoming.
But adversity is a great, massive stimuli for those few with right mindset on their own, even if it stuns most. They would wither and get comfortable in comfort and security, instead they gather drive and focus that very few can match eventually. Often great men and women, albeit broken deep inside.
[flagged]
That is not what the person said, you are unfairly mischaracterizing the reply because you obviously did not understand it. I agree with the poster that it is great that person succeeded but I think the Op is rather crass to spend a hundred words describing how they succeed with literally no explanation. Which safety nets? What did he/she do to overcome? Feels more like BS without some details about the important parts.
I'm suggesting nothing of the sort, and it's disingenuous to suggest I did. I'm just saying that him being one of the purple group in his cohort doesn't in any way contradict the fact that that group is smaller than among people with easier childhoods.
1 reply →
Nope. The point is that one story doesn't compensate the result of an experience over 1000 stories.
I agree. I find it hilarious when Americans complain about America. Most have no clue how good they have it.
I'd bet that most do, but also know that America could be better and want it to be better. No one has to be ignorant about what is good in order to see what needs improving.
Why is it funny to want to make our country better? Do you believe it's impossible for America to more wisely spend its wealth? Do you believe Americans have it as good as is possible, considering how rich the nation is? I find this silly, because I can simply point at our education and healthcare outcomes to find two readily improvable conditions. Or, our child hunger rates.
> Why is it funny to want to make our country better?
If the complainers had that attitude, I wouldn't mind at all and would endorse it. It's the whiners that have nothing more creative to say than how terrible America is that get me.
1 reply →
That is great to read and I genuinely believe everyone with such adverse experiences will be better off if they lived their life with this attitude. It is also a healthy attitude to focus on what one can control, which is how they choose to think of their situation and act in it.
We should not forget though that at the same time the system in place will also produce people that face live with the same attitude and do all the same things, but with much less success.
Now the big question is, if we can have a system that does a similar job in encouraging your type of attitude while at the same time helping those out better, for whom it doesn't work out as much. Or are these things mutually exclusive.
There is a guy who cofounded a successful company and sold it. When asked if he would retire, his answer is no. Not because he isn't ready for retirement. Not because he wants to continue working or be even more successful. Because he has kids to put through college. Even successful people are not free of financial worry.
I wonder if all this success if fueled by constant adrenaline, no matter if it helps the individual or not. And if yes, if there is a better way.
[dead]