Poverty Mentality

It's not the well off or rich that's the problem. It's the ridiculously well off and rich that are.

The thing is, when people complain about the rich and immorality people assume it means they have issues with success or wealth. That's really not the case. Someone with a few million isn't the issue, even a hundred million isn't the issue. I for one have no issues with wealth and success, within reason.

There comes a point though where it moves past simply wealth and success. There comes a point where what's taken, and hoarded away becomes detrimental to society and humanity as a whole. There comes a point where, a few powerful people keep taking more and more from the overall pool without putting enough back, that all of society suffers for it.

Most people who fall into the sums I said above, aren't really a major problem there. They typically pay all their taxes, they rarely have billions hoarded away in off shore bank accounts, ultimately, they aren't really doing anything wrong.

Most people that fall into reasonable wealth, are normal people who like you said, got there for reasons other than just wealth and power. These people are, however, not the problem.

The wealthy that are the problem are the multi-billionaires with giant off shore bank accounts, who's only real major expenditures are put towards finding more ways to take more and more out of the collective pool and place a larger and larger percentage of the worlds wealth into their hands and under their control.

There aren't that many of them and these aren't the rich you typically see. Also, they could never have succeeded as they have if they weren't charismatic and didn't know how to at least pretend to be human. Someone seeming nice, and someone being nice are two very different things.

That said, when most people complain about the rich, really they mean the top one percent who controls more and more of the worlds wealth each year, while the rest of the world suffers and has less and less.

a reply to: Puppylove

But my post wasn't about the 1% complaint.

It was about poverty mentality, in which people develop the deep belief (as a coping mechanism) that having financial abundance goes hand in hand with moral corruption. It was about coping with poverty through adopting a sense of ethical or moral superiority in relation to those who have more than yourself.

I was talking about the poor kid who learns to say, "yeah, okay, they have cool cars and clothes, but obviously they are arrogant insensitive jerks - unlike me." Pride and prejudice.

Perhaps it was easy to misread as a commentary upon some recent cultural movements in the US- I've been out of touch, being out of the country for so many years, so am not hit by a barrage of political debate on wealth disparity in the USA. I was focusing on a much smaller and personal scale.

Great thread!

I agree that doing what you love can bring financial rewards. When that happened to me the best part was being able to tell everyone who told me it was foolish being an artist, take whatever work you can find - and tell them I've never been happier or better off. I choose my own hours, pick my own subject matter, take off when the weather is really nice.

When that finally ran dry it didn't bother me to deliver pizzas or do landscaping work, if that's all that's available. You do what you have to do to support your family. There's no shame in doing any work, the trick is to take pride in what you do and do it to the best of your ability; whether it's raking leaves or cleaning toilets. If you aren't getting paid much you should at least get the satisfaction of knowing you did your work well.

My best advice to young people is to find what you love and make a career out of it somehow. Don't have kids until you get established and can support them while still doing what you enjoy. If you don't you will hate life and resent your responsibilities. I never planned on having children but I thank God my wife had different ideas. I would have waited a little longer to have them but they are the greatest joy you can ever have in life.

Eta: I've worked with some of the very richest people and can testify they are a mixed bag - some are even bigger A-holes than you could imagine while others are just as nice and ordinary as anyone you could ever meet. In other words they are not all alike by any means.

a reply to: Bluesma
ok understood, but as someone who semi-qualifies as poor, when I think similarly to this, it's only the filthy rich I have such feelings about. Those who are so enamored by their wealth they have no concern for the damage they are doing to others with their continued pursuit of excess. I think, even amongst the poor most of us realize this. I don't think the people you're dealing with are quite those most are thinking of when they think of the rich as money grubbing sociopaths. Heck any of us is one lucky lottery ticket or obscure dead relative away from the wealth you're talking about.

Really there's the filthy rich, and everybody else. A millionaire is not much different than a pauper in the grand scheme of things in comparison.

a reply to: Asktheanimals

To be fair, and this is my opinion, you cannot be amongst the richest of the rich AND be a good person. The very act of being that rich, is in my opinion committing a crime against humanity. It's wealth in extreme excess, and such excess harms the world as a whole. Simply existing in, and staying in such a state of extreme excess at the expense of humanity as a whole is in my opinion amoral.

Addendum: This is not to say, on a one on one basis they can't be a fun, funny, and decent fellow, but no matter how nice and personable you are to individuals you associate with, no amount of "niceness" can make up for the harm you are doing by neglecting the needs of society by excess hoarding of wealth from an ever shrinking pool.

a reply to: Puppylove

One fellow I did work for was a famous author, that's how he came by his millions - how is that wrong or evil? I understand your point though because most the very rich do so by unethical means but there are some who came by their wealth honestly and without doing wrong to anyone.

Eta: apologies. I didn't read your post carefully. In principle I agree but on the other hand people need to do something to earn something. Hoarding money is wrong when there is so much need in the world. The question becomes at what point is too much money wrong to keep?

a reply to: Asktheanimals

That's the big question, BUT I personally don't see how the one percent is defensible at all. It's so clearly extreme that I just can't fathom how people can say it's earned or acceptable.

I mean short of literally saving the world from complete destruction by oneself I do not see anything a person can contribute to society to be worthy of such extreme extravagance and abundance. People say this money is earned, I say it's stolen, since to earn something requires you to be worthy of what you've acquired. No one is worthy of such extreme wealth over anyone else. I mean are these 1% really billions or trillions times more worthy as a human being than everyone else? I don't think so.

a reply to: ManInAsia

Yep, we all have different perspectives from our experiences in life. I live in America, so my view is undoubtedly America-centered. How should I be different? Yes, I have the luxury of a partner who makes a good living, while we are not wealthy by any means, and this has not always been so. He was in the military making a pittance for years, while I I have been working since I was fifteen, I have not lived in the lap of luxury for my entire life, nor do I now, while I realize that definition is subjective.

It seems as though my post was considered while you wrote your own, and I may be mistaken, but as someone who does consider my resources, whether limited or unlimited, you might want to think about how all Americans consider resources. Do you think we all have no appreciation for what we have?

When that finally ran dry it didn't bother me to deliver pizzas or do landscaping work, if that's all that's available. You do what you have to do to support your family. There's no shame in doing any work, the trick is to take pride in what you do and do it to the best of your ability; whether it's raking leaves or cleaning toilets. If you aren't getting paid much you should at least get the satisfaction of knowing you did your work well.

This is the way I have always seen things too. I recently have had to face a totally different mindset, which really blew me away.
It's still on the subject of poverty, abundance, and our mindsets which keep us in one or another state,
though going into a different branch of that subject that I just have the need to write out (and it's my thread, I'll do what I want to... ).

A few years ago, I took a job working as a cook in a hospital kitchen. Now, in France, the meals are of higher quality in such environments like hospitals and schools, food is sacred here, so no jello making- we do things by hand, we make our own pastries, spend the day making a sauce from scratch...just to be clear. But still, it is manual work and as such, considered a lower class activity. Most of my colleagues stopped formal education at 15 and were, for the most part, illiterate. Many had to ask me to do things like write and post the daily menu (and I'm the foriegner!)

When a physical problem made me unable to continue the work, and the doctor advised the hospital to move me into a post in administration, I was surprised at the way people responded to me. It was constantly assumed that I wouldn't be capable of doing anything of that sort- and wouldn't want to!

I couldn't understand this assumption! I have been a bilingual secretary, I have managed a business for someone else, I have had my own enterprise (in which I did my own accounting, thank you very much). They didn't know this, and when the director of human resources took a look into my file and background, he suddenly changed his whole demeanor towards me, and expressed surprise at my previous experiences (and gave me a job in admin.)

But the repeated assumptions and comments that I must be a "manual" type person and hate having to do anything "intellectual" really stirred my curiosity.

Their culture is different than ours! Here, instead of guiding young people in the educative and career path they want, it is determined what they are naturally good at and they are pushed in that direction. There is no concept of "self development" and working on oneself to overcome weaknesses or flaws- you are what you are, and you accept that. You are a product of your genetics, and the environment you grew up in. It is the wider social and familial context that they turn to for a sense of self.

So, no one steps out of their pre-ordained slot in life! You wouldn't see a person step down to taking a less lucrative or socially valued job in between projects. If you're a "brain" as they say here, you are incapable of being a "hand" and vice versa. People in positions of responsibility do not have experience in the areas of those their inferiors do- they went into higher education (without working while in school, that isn't done here) and then directly into their higher positions.

In a sense, what I realized is that it was sort of a mistake to have ever taken this job- it has drastically effected my ability to get other jobs that are not "manual". Luckily for me, I am more concerned about my spiritual and individual development and experience than my social status in the community; but I am lucid about the fact that this has and will cause me moments of discomfort.

But seeing this way people can be programmed to limit their perception of what is possible, and what they are.... keeping themselves in the same box for a lifetime, (their children as well!) really gave me some contrast to consider my own mental limits in a different way. Hell, in contrast, I've not been hindered by poverty mentality at all.

When my kids were younger, and I talked a lot with other parents about our kids, I wondered why everyone around here just about took it for granted that their child would not have the baccalaurat (like high school diploma, just harder to achieve). Especially when I knew some of these kids were very bright and certainly capable! But they did all get steered out of school around 15 anyway.

I think now, the ONLY reason I saw poverty- instilled habits of behavior and thought as a "problem" or obstacle, is precisely because I saw the possibility of change. Some people don't have that dawn on them, and in fact, live within their self imposed limits quite comfortably. They might not have certain comforts and luxuries, but they live without putting pressure on themselves either.

I still take off on a shopping spree, with the strange knowledge that I can spend as much as I want today, and intending to do so. Did that two days ago. Gave myself a self imposed limit of 300 euros. Spent 60 euros by the end of the day.
So I'm still acting under invisible limits, but at least, I am thinking, it could be worse. Everything is relative.

I like your take on wealth and agree, some could easily spread some wealth with no effect on themselves. But there so in to their selfish persuits they havent even thought of it. That is why they are good at hoarding because that is all they are good at. One way focused mind. On the other hand if I might add and that way steer back towards the direction of the original post. I will say this, its our job to make the one percent feel like the ridiculous fools they have become.We are rich enough to do so!
a reply to: Puppylove