Quit Bashing “The Poor”

As the economic situation of this country seems to go down the toilet, more and more people seem to want to voice their opinion on “the poor”. The definition of “poor” is usually defined by the government as someone that makes under a certain income. Stuart Varney seems to have his own conception about how “poor” people get that way:

In the last week, the AP published a series of sob stories about poor people who were having trouble making it in today’s economy. It received a lot of criticism from Blaze readers (I personally like the Blaze, although not all the commentators).

Stop painting the poor with some broad brush. The “poverty” level is just a number. Do people realize that two different families with the same income can live completely different lifestyles?

It is true that there are people that spend years on welfare and never do anything about it. It’s also true that for some, “poverty” is just a bump in the road between years of prosperity. In my family’s case, we used to make the equivalent of six figures… and I expect, between my business, the business that my husband helped found, and the law degree that my husband is in the process of getting, that we will not be among the “impoverished” several years from now.

What makes Stuart Varney think that I am “poor in spirit” because I don’t earn much money? I go to church… in fact, I give to the church when I can, even though that means that I might have to put in a little extra hours working. I spend a lot of time with my kids – that usually happens when you homeschool. I read books by Gibbon and Geoffrey of Monmouth, and can converse with you on topics like the Little Ice Age and how to protect your emergency equipment from an EMP blast. I didn’t vote for Obama and I support the Tea Party. I don’t support the RINOs that seem to be the media darlings for the Republican presidential nomination either. I support small government, and support massive cuts in entitlements. I don’t use the entitlement that most people take to send their kids to a public school. So from where am I lacking this “richness of spirit” that Mr. Varney seems to think comes with a massive income?

People with the same incomes can live completely different lifestyles. We’re not in debt. We couldn’t afford credit cards even if we wanted them, because we couldn’t afford the payments. We own our two cars outright – one of my cars is 24 years old (I didn’t even have a driver’s license back then). The other car we once had a payment on, but I’m glad to get rid of that, because it was hard to afford. If there’s any way possible, I’d like to pay cash for our next car. I’ll have to save up for that one.

We cut back in many areas that most people spend a lot of money on. My cell phone is for emergencies only and is prepaid, so it’s pretty cheap. Cable and internet are free with our apartment, which is relatively inexpensive since it’s student housing. Those savings, combined with not having car or credit card payments, allow us to live fairly comfortably, even though we live below the “poverty line”. When we first lost the majority of our income, it was hard, but we’ve learned to live with it. I’d like more wiggle room, but we’re okay. We’ll be wealthier someday, more than likely. My main complaint is with people who think that “poor” people are Obama-supporting, high-school dropout, idiotic welfare cheats that don’t have jobs, just because their income happens to be under a certain level. That’s just not the case all of the time.

In some ways, I’m better off than when I was raking in the dough. Back then, we didn’t pay much attention to our spending because the money was always coming. I would spend a $20 like it was nothing. We constantly overdrafted our bank account as a result. That doesn’t happen now. I pay attention to my money. When dd accidentally dropped her tennis shoes in the water, I told her that I couldn’t replace them, and that she needed to pray for shoes. Well, we did, and God provided about 10 pairs of shoes within a week.

So please save your judgements for people based on their income levels. While I do know people who are having financial troubles because they made stupid mistakes, we are not in financial trouble. I know of other people who make less than me that are also not in financial trouble. Money is not a measure of how smart or kind someone is.