Appreciate the response.
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A. Yes public education is provided regardless of station. However, the quality of this education is drastically different from one community to the next. If you are rich you can 'opt out' and go the private route. If you are poor you are most likely stuck making the best of a bad situation. A few exceptional students may be able to overcome the horrible teaching, tough environment and lack of support at home, but most will be doomed to repeat the pattern of their parents.
But to say opportunities, educational or otherwise, do not exist for the poor is simply not true. I realize you did not say this, but that is what I was refuting.
Do disparities exist? Most certainly. But those can be overcome.
Bill Clinton is from Arkansas for Pete's sake. He did pretty well for himself.
B. Getting teeth pulled. Good dental hygiene does not equal just brushing and flossing. It requires regular checkups and cleanings from a dentist- which cost money. If I followed your logic into the automotive world I could check my oil level and top it off when it looks low and my car will not need fixing.
To extend your analogy. A well-maintained vehicle requires less trips to the mechanic and when it does go to the shop, the price of repair is lower.
C. You are so wrong about the diet. I am a vegetarian as well. You cannot tell me it is cheaper than the average american's meat based diet. Healthier? Hell yeah. But I don't think you understand what poor really is. People who are truly poor buy their vegetables in a can or in a bag. If they buy them fresh it is generally lower quality, chemically grown veggies that do not provide as many nutrients(This is slowly changing with the growing number of farmers markets in urban areas but it is still true by and large.) Poor people spend their money on calories and convenience. And most low priced, calorie dense food is either MEAT or artificially created and flavored Crap that keeps people fat and unhealthy. Even the products touted as "healthy" or "good source of whole grains" etc is chock full of high fructose corn syrup.
If I buy processed vegetarian products, then sure, it is expensive. But fruit, vegetables, and grains are very inexpensive. Diet is something intensely personal and it is something over which every free individual has absolute control.
If someone eschews a healthy diet over processed shit, they will most likely end up a lard-ass.
You or I may be abe to make smart purchasing decisions because we have the dough, or the education, or the free time to sit here on the internet looking up good and cheap ways to feed ourselves- but the average mother of 4 working 2 jobs and shopping for her family at super walmart is not in the same position.
What
average mother with four kids works
two jobs? From my perspective the
average single mother with four kids is on public assistance.
Regardless. I do think it is possible to become middle class coming from poor roots. I think it is rare and an exception to join the 1%, without a great idea or friends in high places. I do not believe for a minute that the "rich" get that way by working their asses off. But my definition of rich may be different from yours. A person making 100k or 200k may have gotten there by working their ass off, but that does look rich to me. It looks like a contractor who might lose everything during a recession. I don't know the statistics but most of the folks I know making 100k+ came from a middle class background.
Rich people need poor people to stay poor and create the environment for that to happen. It is a simple fact.
I believe the Liberal stereotype of the idle rich who inherited his wealth stems from a desire to justify a deep-seated hatred.
Most 'rich' people are not Thurston Howell, III. They are more like Michael Dell. The same guy who did not get rich at the expense of his employees. On the contrary, he made them rich, too. In Austin, they are called Dellionaires.
And how many fortunes and how much economic activity resulted from the hard work of Bill Gates? It's inconceivable how much wealth his efforts have produced for other people.
What do those two men have in common? College dropouts. Both of them.
The vast majority of poor people are poor because they keep making the same dumb-ass choices which keep them in a cycle of poverty.
And poor is a state of mind. I have been broke before, but I have never been poor.
