Plights of Poor Not Poverty

 
   In high school I had a conversation with a friend who was the child of a single mother where we came to the conclusion that we were both "lower middle class". We were poor, but not so poor to call ourselves poor. We always had food (even if occasionally the government or church helped provide it) and a good place to live. We could do a few fun things with friends but not everything they could do.
   The internet is littered with tips on how to stretch and save your money. Along with contemptuous comments about if an entire generation of people simply "worked harder" and utilized basic money saving techniques we would  magically be lifted out of poverty. The suggestion that an entire generation, or any of many job fields are simply "not working hard enough" to earn basic necessities, or comforts is ridiculous. First of all, if they have a job they are working hard enough to afford necessities. There is this weird lack of empathy that people have for any group they can label as other. People literally don't feel like refugees, immigrants or people in poverty are people, and therefore intrinsically deserving of basic dignity, compassion or necessities. I will never understand this attitude. Ever.

Once I was lightly scolded by relative from my parents' generation by comparing the recession of the 90s/early 2000s to the depression. I had not finished my sentence when she berated me for daring to compare them. She told me how much she hates the comparison because the Great Depression was (gasp) worse. If growing up I was "lower middle class" (poor), during that time she was "upper middle class". The kind of upper middle class that grew up "lower middle class" (poor) but was able to use her college education, her husband's college education and military experience to rise to an economic place to be able to raise six children (twice the children than in my home growing up) in a spacious 3 floor home, the kind with a living room and a family room.  She was offended by the insinuation that she felt I was about to make that the recession was detrimental to some families, with continuing effects to this day, because that was not her experience. Nor was I qualified to talk about those experiences or effects because I wasn't as knowledgeable as her.
 When discussing the student loan debt the same relative dismissed an entire generation in debt as reckless spenders. In a conversation about student loans and the cost of going to now mandatory higher education she cited credit cards and reckless spending as the cause of a generation's financial struggle.
My boss, who was on salary and the only full time employee at our entire branch of our catering company, lectured me about working his way through college while paying me less than a dollar over minimum wage (in my state $7.25).
   People have unabashed hatred of poor and people in poverty. It makes people really upset that groups of people talk about being poor without being poverty stricken. People who are poor are yelled at for complaining about  facts regarding wages, housing, inflation or the price of higher education. People get mad that they bring up inconvenient facts that call for action. They respond with basic money saving tips. As if, they are not making use of money saving techniques. Basic lesson: you can not use money saving tips to get out of poverty, and the suggestion that poor people or people in poverty should be in a constant state of spend no money on anything is not a realistic suggestion to have decent quality of living and is a suggestion devoid of compassion. People should not live in a constant state of worry over their finances, where they are unable to spend the money they earn. You don't need to yell at poor people for buying anything that you consider a luxury, especially when you view anything above a basic necessity as a luxury. Poor people (and people in poverty) are not inherently undeserving. They are people. Just. Like. You.  They are working hard enough. A lot of them have been put at a distinct disadvantages that you have not had either because of when they were born (during or post the recession), their race or their gender.
   People in poverty don't owe you their backstory to earn your empathy and understanding that they are people. People who are poor do not deserve your contempt for not being in poverty, or for the fact that they have been put in a position where they work as hard or harder than you but are unable to attain what you have because action is required from others to rectify the unjust system that is actually responsible for their predicament (whether that be low wages, high rent or any other combination of outside factors).