#poverty across generations

[povertyeradicationday]

Poverty is preventable.

Education.

Poor children typically go to rundown schools with inadequate facilities where they receive inadequate schooling. They are much less likely than wealthier children to graduate from high school or to go to college. Their lack of education in turn restricts them and their own children to poverty, once again helping to ensure a vicious cycle of continuing poverty across generations. As Chapter 10 “The Changing Family” explains, scholars debate whether the poor school performance of poor children stems more from the inadequacy of their schools and schooling versus their own poverty. Regardless of exactly why poor children are more likely to do poorly in school and to have low educational attainment, these educational problems are another major consequence of poverty .

[hella1975]

hella idk what to send to you for aftg im either bored or annoyed and I don't wanna just say bad things about it 😭 like that's just rude and yall obviously like it I DONT WANNA BE SOME DEBBY DOWNER MDMWKEM

I looked at the anti aftg tag too to see if I could intermingle there and last I checked it was a mix of fans obsessed with the series and haters being just a tad harsh imo, so i couldn't even do that RIP. I'm so lonesome in what is maybe a whole group of people gaslighting me 😔👊

honestly ive said this before and i always have to tread a very fine line with it because this isn't me saying it's OKAY or like. promotable. but i do think to an extent that aftg's problematicness is actually an aspect of what draws people in a lot. like the characters and their reactions to things feel real for who they are, what they've been through and the environments they were raised in if that makes sense? and then you go in the anti-aftg tag and it's just again and again 'they said THIS thing and acted THIS way in response to THIS scenario and it was PROBLEMATIC' and like. yeah. outside of the internet bubble you're in people do actually do that. like that behaviour exists. it IS problematic, well done. you pointed at a wall and called it a wall. but like? in real life people - PARTICULARLY deprived, traumatised people that typically don't ever get therapy or community or someone telling them why something is bad - DO act this way. ive said half of my love for andrew is literally just because he took an awful backstory and let it make him a complete cunt and ive NEVER seen a character do it as shamelessly as him before. and yeah there's the argument for how it's never resolved in the book where nora ties it with a bow and points at the bad behaviour so the readers can go 'see, this is wrong' and we all clap, but idk it just for me feels that when people point at the aftg characters and go problematic! problematic! problematic! it's like they're missing the point a bit.

the point being? that we need to be putting WAY more heat on the author. i really dislike her and a lot of her writing choices and her insistance of using slurs that aren't hers to reclaim and just because it happened to make the characters feel just that bit more authentic i can still acknowledge that she CLEARLY wrote it without characterisation in mind and just added all that problematic shit anyway. like i never get why there's so little focus on nora's writing decisions and thousands of posts just fucking CRUCIFYING the characters themselves and 'let's explain in detail why this behaviour is Morally Reprehensible and they should be Locked Up Forever'. like if u want to focus on the characters so bad and pretend they're the sole reason why aftg is Problematic and Bad then why is it so hard to acknowledge that someone raised the way they were might have some misinformed, ignorant beliefs. idk lol

[reasonsforhope]

"Cody Two Bears, a member of the Sioux tribe in North Dakota, founded Indigenized Energy, a native-led energy company with a unique mission — installing solar farms for tribal nations in the United States.

This initiative arises from the historical reliance of Native Americans on the U.S. government for power, a paradigm that is gradually shifting.

The spark for Two Bears' vision ignited during the Standing Rock protests in 2016, where he witnessed the arrest of a fellow protester during efforts to prevent the construction of the Dakota Access Pipeline on sacred tribal land.

Disturbed by the status quo, Two Bears decided to channel his activism into action and create tangible change.

His company, Indigenized Energy, addresses a critical issue faced by many reservations: poverty and lack of access to basic power.

Reservations are among the poorest communities in the country, and in some, like the Navajo Nation, many homes lack electricity.

Even in regions where the land has been exploited for coal and uranium, residents face obstacles to accessing power.

Renewable energy, specifically solar power, is a beacon of hope for tribes seeking to overcome these challenges.

Not only does it present an environmentally sustainable option, but it has become the most cost-effective form of energy globally, thanks in part to incentives like the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022.

Tribal nations can receive tax subsidies of up to 30% for solar and wind farms, along with grants for electrification, climate resiliency, and energy generation.

And Indigenized Energy is not focused solely on installing solar farms — it also emphasizes community empowerment through education and skill development.

In collaboration with organizations like Red Cloud Renewable, efforts are underway to train Indigenous tribal members for jobs in the renewable energy sector.

The program provides free training to individuals, with a focus on solar installation skills.

Graduates, ranging from late teens to late 50s, receive pre-apprenticeship certification, and the organization is planning to launch additional programs to support graduates with career services such as resume building and interview coaching...

The adoption of solar power by Native communities signifies progress toward sustainable development, cultural preservation, and economic self-determination, contributing to a more equitable and environmentally conscious future.

These initiatives are part of a broader movement toward "energy sovereignty," wherein tribes strive to have control over their own power sources.

This movement represents not only an economic opportunity and a source of jobs for these communities but also a means of reclaiming control over their land and resources, signifying a departure from historical exploitation and an embrace of sustainable practices deeply rooted in Indigenous cultures."

-via Good Good Good, December 10, 2023

[luveline]

Ahh I’m so obsessed with stripper!reader and Spencer!! Do you have any more thoughts about them you’d be willing to share, maybe just a snippet of their life together? So so in love with them and your writing in general

i got a different request for them that I lost about reader struggling to afford essentials and so I thought I’d combine them, I hope that’s ok!! <;3 fem, 1.1k

cw food insecurity/ poverty 

You attempt to save money, but the ten dollars you don't spend on shampoo and conditioner gets used on painkillers. You hide fifty dollars in a book and try to forget about it, but your shoes split open on the walk to work, and it takes all afternoon to find it again. You try so hard to stretch your paycheck and something new makes it impossible. 

So it's a cold night in late December and you spent all your money for food on the gas bill. Your stomach hurts, but at least your nose isn't that horrible stiff cold that distracts. 

It's not just that your stomach hurts, though. You feel miserable about everything, and you know you need to ask someone for help. You've thought about selling something, but you already pawned your watch, and everything else is inconsequential. 

I could sell my phone… but how would I talk to Spencer? 

It's the stupidest thought you could've had. More importantly, how would you communicate with work? How would you call your electric and gas company, or talk to your landlord? 

Spencer would be so sad if he knew you’d sold your phone to pay for food. He’d probably be upset knowing you considered it. And you won’t get paid for another three days, so unless you can somehow live off of olives and cherries from the club bar, you have to ask Spencer for money or get a loan. With your credit score, one situation is more likely than the other. 

You bring your phone across the pillow and sigh before clicking on his contact. He’s practically the only number you call. 

“Hello?” you ask. 

“Hi, Y/N.” 

“Hello, handsome,” you murmur, staging an affect of someone who couldn’t be more unbothered by the world. 

“Yeah, hi. You okay?” 

You don’t want to butter him up. It feels dishonest. You should be straight forward. “Spencer. You know I hate asking you for things.” 

“Yes, it’s the only bad thing about you.” He sounds like he’s smiling. You can imagine him on his couch reading something obscure, or watching one of his sci-fi shows, curls in his eyes, grey pyjamas too short for him riding up his calves as they tend to do.

“But I need– um. I don’t have any money?” You don’t mean to phrase it like a question. “Like. Okay, so, I promise you I am not an irresponsible person, just, my gas bill went up and I didn’t know, but it’s so cold I paid it anyways, and now I have three dollars. Um. Total. And I haven’t eaten all day and I’m sorry I’m asking, but I just need like twenty dollars until I get paid on Tuesday. Could you let me borrow twenty dollars, please?” 

“Do you want to get takeout?” 

You cringe. “No, like, twenty dollars for groceries, Spence.” 

“No, I understood. That’s fine, I’ll happily give you twenty dollars. But you said you haven’t eaten today? And I miss you, so it’s an excuse?” Now he’s the one making questions out of statements. “I can get us Thai food.” 

Your stomach pangs at the thought. No matter how much you hate this, you know he loves you enough to want to bring you dinner, and you really will pay him back, so he might as well. “Yeah, please. I’d love to see you, Dr. Reid.”

“I’ll be quick,” he promises. 

He isn’t. You wonder if he’s forgotten you and your rumbling stomach, curled into a c-shape under the sheets. It’s warm, at least, nearly too warm, the blade of your hunger threatening to drive you mad. It’s not a nice feeling, depending on the kindness of a friend to see you through, nor is it very pleasant to be this hungry. You’ve gone hungry a hundred times, and this is the only time you’ve ever had someone you trusted enough to turn to during that time to ask for help. What if Spencer’s decided he isn’t comfortable with your lending after all and he doesn’t come over tonight? 

You’d been looking forward to seeing him again. It’s almost worse than the hunger. 

Just as you’re thinking he’s decided he doesn’t want to be your friend anymore, he lets himself in. 

Your apartment is small, consisting of three rooms. The bedroom, the bathroom, and the living room kitchen combination. He lets himself into the living room with a cacophony of rustling and a called, “Hello!” followed soon by a muttered swear. 

You laugh under your breath.

“Are you coming out here, or do you want to eat dinner in bed?” he asks. 

“I haven’t decided yet.” 

It’s quiet enough besides his arrival that you’ve no need to shout.

“Well, stay there if you want. Have you been drinking anything? I brought iced tea and some stuff for you to have breakfast tomorrow.”

“Thank you.” You force yourself to sit up. One moment you’re looking at the closed door and the next you’re squinting against the light of the kitchen, Spencer in the doorway like a silhouette against it. “Hey, Spence. You’re taller than last time.” 

“I’m the same size as always.”

“You’re still wearing your shoes. That must be it.” 

Spencer takes off his shoes and crosses the short distance to you. “Hi,” he says, taking your hand as he sits down. His fingers are freezing. “Sorry I took a while.”

“Sorry for asking you for money.” 

“It’s okay. It’s not something to worry about. Everyone has to ask a favour sometime.” 

His hair is wind blown, his eyes watery. The cold weather has nipped his pert nose a rosy pink and he’s smiling at you with chapped lips, unaware of or uncaring about his own circumstances in the face of yours. “You okay?” he asks, his pretty brown eyes narrowing, eyebrows pinching together at the starts. “You can’t just not eat all day and not tell me.”

You nod tightly. It’s humiliating to be in this position. 

He softens. “Did they tell you the rate was rising? It’s illegal in Virginia–”

You take your hand from his. “They sent me a letter I didn’t open. I knew it would be bad news.” 

Spencer looks down at your knees. “I know that you’re used to doing things by yourself, but you don’t have to anymore.”

“‘Cos you look after me,” you say quietly. 

“I’m trying to.” 

You laugh and jog your joined hands to make him look up. “Okay. Look after me some more then and give me a hug. I’m too warm, and you’re freezing.” 

He hugs you tightly, quick to rub your shoulder blade with his thumb. “Stay here, okay? I’ll bring you a plate.” 

You cling to him for a few seconds, until hunger wins, and you send him off into the kitchen again. 

[truth-has-a-liberal-bias]

But once the babies are here, the state provides little help.

When she got pregnant, Mayron Michelle Hollis was clinging to stability.

At 31, she was three years sober, after first getting introduced to drugs at 12. She had just had a baby three months earlier and was working to repair the damage that her addiction had caused her family.

The state of Tennessee had taken away three of her children, and she was fighting to keep her infant daughter, Zooey. Department of Children’s Services investigators had accused Mayron of endangering Zooey when she visited a vape store and left the baby in a car.

Her husband, Chris Hollis, was also in recovery.

The two worked in physically demanding jobs that paid just enough to cover rent, food and lawyers’ fees to fight the state for custody of Mayron’s children.

In the midst of the turmoil in July 2022, they learned Mayron was pregnant again. But this time, doctors warned she and her fetus might not survive.

The embryo had been implanted in scar tissue from her recent cesarean section. There was a high chance that the embryo could rupture, blowing open her uterus and killing her, or that she could bleed to death during delivery. The baby could come months early and face serious medical risks, or even die.

But the Supreme Court had just overturned Roe v. Wade, which guaranteed the right to abortion across the United States. By the time Mayron decided to end her pregnancy, Tennessee’s abortion ban — one of the nation’s strictest — had gone into effect.

The total ban made no explicit exceptions — not even to save the life of a pregnant patient. Any doctor who violated the ban could be charged with a felony.

Women with means could leave the state. But those like Mayron, with limited resources or lives entangled with the child welfare and criminal justice systems, would be the most likely to face caring for a child they weren’t prepared for.

And so, the same state that questioned Mayron’s fitness to care for her four children forced her to continue a pregnancy that risked her life to have a fifth, one that would require more intensive care than any of the others.

Tennessee already had some of the worst outcomes in the nation when measuring maternal health, infant mortality and child poverty. Lawmakers who paved the way for a new generation of post-Roe births did little to bolster the state’s meager safety net to support these babies and their families.

In December 2022, when Mayron was 26 weeks and two days pregnant, she was rushed to the hospital after she began bleeding so heavily that her husband slipped in her blood. An emergency surgery saved her life. Her daughter, Elayna, was born three months early.

Afterward, photographer Stacy Kranitz and reporter Kavitha Surana followed Mayron and her family for a year to chronicle what life truly looked like in a state whose political leaders say they are pro-life. [...]

[batboyblog]

Things Biden and the Democrats did, this week #3

Jan 26-Feb 2 2024

The House overwhelmingly passed a tax deal that will revive the expanded Child Tax Credit, this will effect 16 million American children and lift 400,000 out of poverty in the first year. The deal also supports the building of 200,000 housing units over the next two years, and provides tax relief for communities hit by disasters.

The Biden Administration has begun negotiations on drug prices for Medicare. Earlier this year the administration announced it would negotiate for the first time directly with drug manufacturers on the prices of 10 common medications. This week they sent their opening offers to the companies. The program is expected to save Medicare and enrollees billions over dollars over the long term and help push down drug prices for everyone.

The Department of Transportation has green lit $240 Million to modernize air ports across the country. Air Ports in 37 states will be able to get much needed updates and refurbishment.

The Biden Administration announced 10 sites across America as sites for innovation investment. They will receive up to 2 billion dollars each over the next 10 years. The goal is to stimulate economic growth and innovation in semiconductor manufacturing, clean energy, sustainable textiles, climate-resilient agriculture, regenerative medicine, and more.

The State Department reviews options for recognizing Palestinian Statehood. While as of yet there's been no policy change this review of options is a major shift in US diplomatic thinking which has long opposed Palestinian Statehood and shows a seriousness of reported Biden plans to push for Statehood as part of a post-war Israel-Saudi normalization deal.

President Biden imposes sanctions on Israeli settlers who have engaged in violence against Palestinians and peace activists. This marks the first time the US has leveled sanctions against Israelis and sets up a standard that could see the whole settlement movement cut off from the US financial system

the Department of Energy has tentatively agreed to a $1.5 Billion dollar loan to help reopen a Michigan nuclear power plant. This would mark the first time a closed nuclear plant has been brought back online. Closed in 2022 it's hoped that it could reopen in time to be generating power in late 2025. This is part of Biden's plan to decarbonize the electricity grid by 2035.

the Internal Revenue Service launched a program to allow tax fillers file for free directly with the government. In 2024 its a pilot program limited to 12 states, but plans for it to be nation wide by tax day 2025

The Department of Health and Human Services announced $28 million in grants to help with the treatment of substance use disorder, including a program aimed at pregnant and postpartum women, and expanded drug court aimed at directing people into treatment and out of the criminal justice system.

The Department of Energy announced $72 million for 46 hydroelectric projects across 19 states. This marks the single largest investment in Hydropower in US history.

The Senate confirmed President Biden's 175th federal judge. Biden has now appointed more federal judges in his first term in office than President Obama did in his, however still lags behind Trump's 186 judges. For the first time in history a majority of a President's nominees are not white men, 65% of them are women and 65% are people of color, President Biden has appointed more black women to judgeships than any administration in history.

[she-is-ovarit]

By EDITH M. LEDERER Updated 9:11 PM PST, March 8, 2024 UNITED NATIONS (AP) — Legal equality for women could take centuries as the fight for gender equality is becoming an uphill struggle against widespread discrimination and gross human human rights abuses, the United Nations chief said on International Women’s Day. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres told a packed U.N. commemoration Friday that “a global backlash against women’s rights is threatening, and in some cases reversing, progress in developing and developed countries alike.” The most egregious example is in Afghanistan, he said, where the ruling Taliban have barred girls from education beyond sixth grade, from employment outside the home, and from most public spaces, including parks and hair salons. At the current rate of change, legal equality for women could take 300 years to achieve and so could ending child marriage, he said. Guterres pointed to “a persistent epidemic of gender-based violence,” a gender pay gap of at least 20%, and the underrepresentation of women in politics. He cited September’s annual gathering of world leaders at the U.N. General Assembly, where just 12% of the speakers were women. “And the global crises we face are hitting women and girls hardest — from poverty and hunger to climate disasters, war and terror,” the secretary-general said. In the past year, Guterres said, there have been testimonies of rape and trafficking in Sudan, and in Gaza women women and children account for a majority of the more than 30,000 Palestinians reported killed in the Israeli-Hamas conflict, according to the Gaza Ministry of Health. He cited a report Monday by the U.N. envoy focusing on sexual violence in conflict that concluded there are “reasonable grounds” to believe Hamas committed rape, “sexualized torture” and other cruel and inhumane treatment of women during its surprise attack in southern Israel on Oct. 7. He also pointed to reports of sexual violence against Palestinians detained by Israel. International Women’s Day grew out of labor movements in North America and across Europe at the turn of the 20th century and was officially recognized by the United Nations in 1977. This year’s theme is investing in women and girls to accelerate progress toward equality. Roza Otunbayeva, the head of the U.N. political mission in Afghanistan, told the Security Council on Wednesday that what is happening in that country “is precisely the opposite” of investing in women and girls. There is “a deliberate disinvestment that is both harsh and unsustainable,” she said, saying the Taliban’s crackdown on women and girls has caused “immense harm to mental and physical health, and livelihoods.” Recent detentions of women and girls for alleged violations of the Islamic dress code “were a further violation of human rights, and carry enormous stigma for women and girls,” she said. It has had “a chilling effect among the wider female population, many of whom are now afraid to move in public,” she said. Otunbayeva again called on the Taliban to reverse the restrictions, warning that the longer they remain, “the more damage will be done.” Sima Bahous, the head of UN Women, the agency promoting gender equality and women’s rights, told the commemoration that International Women’s Day “sees a world hobbled by confrontation, fragmentation, fear and most of all inequality.” “Poverty has a female face,” she said. “One in every 10 women in the world lives in extreme poverty.” Men not only dominate the halls of power but they “own $105 trillion more wealth than women,” she said. Bahous said well-resourced and powerful opponents of gender equality are pushing back against progress. The opposition is being fueled by anti-gender movements, foes of democracy, restricted civic space and “a breakdown of trust between people and state, and regressive policies and legislation,” she said. [Click on the link to continue reading]

[call-sign-shark]

Day 3: Engraved in the Flesh || Finn Shelby x Reader

Requested by a lovely anon 🖤

TW: Kinktober prompt- marked, canonical violence, violent sexual practice, spanking, marking kink, non-protected sex, allusion to anal

Words: 630.

Notes: This work is a part of the Peaky Kinktober Event you can find here. Comment on the event post if you want to be tagged in the future works for Kinktober. The length of each prompt is random, but it’s never less than 600 words.

The family never suspected something to be wrong with the youngest of the tribe. After all, he had been lucky enough not to know the ugly truth of war nor the physical and emotional torment of hunger or poverty. If anything, Finn had grown up under Polly’s loving wing. Even if he was accustomed with gangs violence, he never truly took part of it before his brothers deemed him old enough. Arthur, Tommy and John worked hard so that he would never had to take a bullet like they did. They wanted him to be a general, not a disposable and vulnerable soldier. When he started to hang out with the pastor’s daughter, his Aunt was delighted. All of Birmingham knew how kind and quiet Y/N was. Holy Saint among the sinners, the young woman often wandered in the gritty streets of Small Heath with a basket filled with food she usually distributed to the poorest souls. Y/N left a bright sunshine in her wake, all the darkness of the place caught in her long coal black hair. Rumors said that when she smiled, even the most wicked men couldn’t lay a finger on her, all blissed out by her beauty and her divine aura of peacefulness. The bruises on her delicate skin? She was just incredibly clumsy. That was what her father always told her! And when she wasn’t bumping or tripping, the heavy basket she carried marked the flesh of her forearms.

But when the night came and the devils danced under the pale moonlight, she disappeared through her window and ran away from home, swallowed by the dull forest nearby. Y/N hid in an old vargo that belonged to the Shelby family, guided by the weak string lights hanging at the door, and she impatiently waited for Finn Shelby to appear in the doorway with a bottle of whisky in one hand, and a red rose in the other. Then their sordid and obscene ritual started, always following the same order: He slipped the flower in her hair, its crimson and velvety petals enhancing her beauty and suiting the color of the lipstick she had stolen from her mother. Then, they made the temperature rise, hands roaming on flesh clothes flying across the vardo. Only when the bottle of whisky was empty and their arousal reaching its limits, he assaulted her tight cunt with violent and rapid thrusts. A glistening and fragile pussy that only knew his cock. No one else’s. The way her warmth and wetness wrapped him sent his soul to heaven, making his lashes flutter. He was supposed to be a nice boy. She was supposed to be a holy and virginal girl.

So why? Why were they fucking like animals each night in the woods, filling the air with moans, flesh snapping sound and sweat? Why did he bend her over and spank her with his suit’s belt — and why did she enjoy it, her love juice trailing down her thighs more and more at each new beating? Finn grunted in her mouth when he came, painting her walls white and keeping her full til the morning. That was how Y/N liked him: engraved in her flesh, and dripping from her sore holes.

“Tsss, be more careful Y/N. You’re black and blue.” Her father scolded her, eyes rolling with annoyance at his daughter’s carelessness that revealed itself through her purplish bruises on her legs, thighs and neck. Little he knew that all her skin had been painted blue, immaculate flesh turned into a masterpiece by the brush of a mad artist. Y/N was both the canva and the muse, letting Finn Shelby turned her into what their love had always been: nothing gentle but the embodiment of Sin.

If you have appreciated what you've just read please take the time to reblog and/or comment. Your reactions are the real fuel and motivation of writers.

Taglist: @emotionalcadaver @peakyswritings @mollybegger-blog @hwangrimi @munson24 @tommyshelbywhore @devotedlyshadowytheorist @stevie75 @brummiereader @triplethreat77 @sebastianstangirl01 @izzy10369 @peakyltd @dreamy-caramel @kimvolturicullen

[probablyasocialecologist]

In international development circles, most people are familiar with the World Bank’s data showing that extreme poverty has declined dramatically over the past several decades, from 43 per cent of the world’s population in 1981 to less than 10 per cent today. This narrative is based on the World Bank’s method of calculating the share of people who live on less than $1.90 per day (in 2011 “PPP” terms). But a growing body of literature argues that the World Bank’s PPP-based method suffers from a major empirical limitation, in that it does not account for the cost of meeting basic needs in any given context (see here, here and here). Having more than $1.90 PPP does not guarantee that a person can afford the specific goods and services that are necessary for survival. In recent years, scholars have developed a more accurate method for measuring extreme poverty, by comparing people’s incomes to the prices of essential goods in each country (specifically food, shelter, clothing and fuel). This approach is known as the “basic needs poverty line” (BNPL), and it more closely approximates what the original concept of “extreme poverty” was intended to measure. 

[...]

Extreme poverty is not a natural condition, but a sign of severe dislocation. Historical data on real wages since the 15th century indicates that under normal conditions, across different societies and eras, people are generally able to meet their subsistence needs except during periods of severe social displacement, such as famines, wars, and institutionalised dispossession, particularly under European colonialism. What is more, BNPL data shows that many countries have managed to keep extreme poverty very close to zero, even with low levels of GDP per capita, by using strategies such as public provisioning and price controls for basic essentials. In other words, extreme poverty can be prevented much more easily than most people assume. Indeed, it need not exist at all. The fact that it persists at such high levels today indicates that severe dislocation is institutionalised in the world economy – and that markets have failed to meet the basic needs of much of humanity. To address this problem, and to end extreme poverty – the first objective of the Sustainable Development Goals – will require public planning to prioritise the production of, and guarantee access to, the specific goods and services that people need to live decent lives.

[tarotwithlove]

PICK A CARD ⋆ life with your future spouse

reminder that this is a general reading and messages found here may not apply to everyone. take what resonates, leave what doesn't, and don't force anything if it does not fit.

BOOK A READING WITH ME · LINKTREE · 18+ PATREON · SUGGEST A PAC TOPIC · TIPS ♡ tips, bookings, and feedback are highly appreciated!

GROUP ONE

my dear group one ♡ your life with your future spouse will be filled with fun. your future spouse comes across as the cool dad/mom. they’re the person in the friend group who is not afraid to make a fool of themselves. they do not care about their image or about looking cool -- which, of course, makes them the coolest person in every room they’re in. they’re authentic. they’re fun. and so your life with your future spouse is as fun and as authentic.

i'm hearing the words “remix on an old classic” so your life together will shun convention. you may be together for years before you get married. you both may quit your jobs to go travelling or live in a commune. you may have an open marriage. whatever it is, your life together is nothing like your peers, your married friends lives, your parents lives… it’s so unique to you two that many people may not understand it at all.

people may look at your marriage, and the life you and your future spouse live together, with raised eyebrows. questioning how either of you could even be happy -- when that is exactly what you and your future spouse are. happy. unbothered. in love with each other, unconditionally.

GROUP TWO

my dear group two ♡ your life with your future spouse is filled with luxury. you and your future spouse may be entrepreneurs and huge go-getters. you both know what it’s like to live a life of difficulty, or hardship, of financial insecurity and/or outright poverty, and you’ve both worked hard to be not just financially free but financially abundant. 

you and your future spouse may not just be a married couple, but also business partners. as a result, many aspects of your life together will concern how to build your wealth and empire and solidify your legacy. every decision you make will be made together, making sure to keep in mind how it will affect your image and your business partnership.

this sounds loveless but it will be anything but. your life will revolve around business and wealth, but it will be something that you both benefit from. it will be the focus of your life because of how much better it makes your life, in union; how much better it makes your children’s lives, your parents lives, yoru descendents lives. it will be the focus of your life because, now that you’ve tasted abundance and stability and security, neither of you can imagine ever going back to a life of lack. back to a life of struggle. 

with this wealth, your future spouse will spoil you, giving you anything you could ever ask for and ever want. and you will do the same for them.

GROUP THREE

my dear group three ♡ your life with your future spouse may be strained. you may marry your future spouse out of obligation, because of a prior arrangement, or because they seem good enough to settle with. your married life will be fairly average and you may find yourself becoming one of those people who says things like, “no one finds their true love anyway. true love is a fantasy, just find someone who is stable and good to you.” 

your marriage may be enviable to the people around you, because you both seem so normal and well-adjusted. you have this white picket fence life. you have stable jobs, you have children who make you proud, you have family vacations and family day trips and family albums filled with beautiful pictures. but… you may feel like your life is just so… empty��

as if you’re living a meaningless life. as if you’re stuck in a meaningless marriage. you may get married at a young age only to, after a few years, find yourself looking for excitement elsewhere. outside of this marriage. eventually, ending this marriage and choosing to live your life for yourself -- regardless of your age. 

[seancosy]

They’re probably not going to find the submarine in time. I hope that after all the messy discourse, we can agree on a few points:

Rules, regulations, best practices and guidelines exist for a reason. So does the study of history. Building an unsafe vessel and sending it on an arguably useless adventure was always a bad idea. There are countless day to day examples we can extend this lesson to.

Compared to recent (and historic) drownings of refugees, these billionaires, who deliberately endangered themselves, are receiving proportionally more attention and sympathy from the media, governments, and the general public. We need to be more compassionate to the poor, and more critical of the institutions that uphold the class system.

The guests on the vessel paid hundreds of thousands of dollars to be there. Millions are being spent in the attempted rescue. Think of how many other useless ‘luxury’ experiences are taking place across the globe, instead of combating poverty or helping the environment. We need to hold governments and the wealthy accountable for their lack of action towards improving society.

Points I don’t think are valid:

Hehehe rich people (including a child) will suffer what is likely a horrific and agonising death. Justice served! -- To me, this is narrow minded and cruel. No one deserved to die like that. Besides that, rich people are just going to sue the ship company, become even more rich, and life for everyone else will continue unchanged; unless we learn from this in a deeper and more understanding way.

[reasonsforhope]

"In cities across the country, people of color, many of them low income, live in neighborhoods criss-crossed by major thoroughfares and highways.

The housing there is often cheaper — it’s not considered particularly desirable to wake up amid traffic fumes and fall asleep to the rumble of vehicles over asphalt.

But the price of living there is steep: Exhaust from all those cars and trucks leads to higher rates of childhood asthma, cancer, cardiovascular disease, and pulmonary ailments. Many people die younger than they otherwise would have, and the medical costs and time lost to illness contributes to their poverty.

Imagine if none of those cars and trucks emitted any fumes at all, running instead on an electric charge. That would make a staggering difference in the trajectory, quality, and length of millions of lives, particularly those of young people growing up near freeways and other sources of air pollution, according to a study from the American Lung Association.

The study, released [February 28, 2024], found that a widespread transition to EVs could avoid nearly 3 million asthma attacks and hundreds of infant deaths, in addition to millions of lower and upper respiratory ailments...

Prior research by the American Lung Association found that 120 million people in the U.S. breathe unhealthy air daily, and 72 million live near a major trucking route — though, Barret added, there’s no safe threshold for air pollution. It affects everyone.

Bipartisan efforts to strengthen clean air standards have already made a difference across the country. In California, which, under the Clean Air Act, can set state rules stronger than national standards, 100 percent of new cars sold there must be zero emission by 2035.

[Note: The article doesn't explain this, but that is actually a much bigger deal than just California. Basically, due to historically extra terrible pollution, California is the only state that's allowed to allowed to set stronger emissions rules than the US government sets. However, one of the rules in the Clean Air Act is that any other state can choose to follow California's standards instead of the US government's. And California by itself is the world's fifth largest economy - ahead of all but four countries. California has a lot of buying power. So, between those two things, when California sets stricter standards for cars, the effects ripple outward massively, far beyond the state's borders.]

Truck manufacturers are, according to the state’s Air Resources Board, already exceeding anticipated zero-emissions truck sales, putting them two years ahead of schedule...

Other states have begun to take action, too, often reaching across partisan lines to do so. Maryland, Colorado, New Mexico, and Rhode Island adopted zero-emissions standards as of the end of 2023.

The Biden administration is taking similar steps, though it has slowed its progress after automakers and United Auto Workers pressured the administration to relax some of its more stringent EV transition requirements.

While Barret finds efforts to support the electrification of passenger vehicles exciting, he said the greatest culprits are diesel trucks. “These are 5 to 10 percent of the vehicles on the road, but they’re generating the majority of smog-forming emissions of ozone and nitrogen,” Barret said...

Lately, there’s been significant progress on truck decarbonization. The Biden administration has made promises to ensure that 30 percent of all big rigs sold are electric by 2030...

Such measures, combined with an increase in public EV charging stations, vehicle tax credits, and other incentives, could change American highways, not to mention health, for good."

-via GoodGoodGood, February 28, 2024

[shockyeahmiguelohara]

The post(s) I've seen on my dashboard discussing the explicit and weasel-y language used to describe Miguel O'Hara in the script for Across the Spiderverse, doesn't surprise me.

Doesn't surprise, but otherwise confirms what I was feeling about how they approached the character wasn't at all inaccurate.

And to top it all off, their language towards Gwen Stacy's father, or and cops in general (including Jeff Morales), is couched in the most blatant "good cops, bad apples" sentiment.

And, when you think about the fact that Miguel O'Hara's character was established and lives in a future where all of Nueva York is a Judge Dredd-type police state, and he is routinely attacked by said police? A script calling him an "animal" but asking the audience to capitulate sympathy for Officer Stacy, is some ole bullshit.

These fools really decided that, out of all the Spider-Man affiliated characters to use in their movie about Miles Morales, they were gonna pick the Spider-Man character whose entire narrative was antithetical to their storytelling.

And then on top of that, create a "utopian" Nueva York specifically to cast criticism on Miguel as a character, who is a cop-esque character hunting down a Black teenager.

I've seen the argument that if he'd been characterized as he was in the comics (leaning more towards whiteness than anything), the writer's sympathies might've been for him. I honestly don't think that'd be the case.

In a lot of ways, Miguel's character is defined by the fact that he is Mexican first before he's white. It's like how Miles was advertised as "Half-Black, Half Puerto-Rican" and that colored everything about Miles as a character was approached pre-Into the Spiderverse. Specifically what parts of his character weren't addressed.

I think you can make the argument of how Miguel was initially promoted to the masses in the 90s ("he's not the nice Spider-Man") carried with its some uncomfy ideas about Mexicans and aggression. (And now carries the consequence of allowing certain writers to mishandle him.)

His whiteness is his access to capital (his job, etc), his general outlook, most of which forms so much of his story. Oppositely, his status as "half Mexican" is typically only used or mentioned in passing. A way to highlight the poverty of his dysfunctional family.

(It doesn't have the presence of say, Miles' connection to his culture through his parents and his neighborhood in the Insomniac game and PS5 sequel.)

And then there's his choice of costume (an outfit he modified from a Dia de los Muertos shindig) and sarcastic references to his status as a biracial child.

His being a biracial Mexican man, and the dystopian future he lived in has always been a big component in framing him as the "take no prisoners" Spider-Man legacy character. But, for all the problems that come with how PAD approached in his titles, there was always context for Miguel's actions and his environment.

And I feel like Across the Spiderverse stripped Miguel of that nuance.

It's also why we ended up with Bendis', "Who cares if I'm Black? I'm also half-Puerto Rican!" speech from Miles in the comics back in 2015/2016.

[wind-up-thancred]

bit of thancred character musing under the cut that im gonna try to approximate from a 6am discord rambling into something i can actually post. both SHB and EW spoilers included

i saw some folks talking on twt about how guilt seems to be a very important factor in his life and i agree. i think a lot of major parts of his character and arcs have been due to guilt over something he did (or didnt even really do, re: the whole goobue rampage situation). it's driven him to work his ass off after louisoix which lead to him getting possessed... but its probably also what motivated him to do better for ryne after being forced to look his fuckups directly in the eye instead of just wallowing about them. but i think, at the same time, he doesnt really seem to, like... actually be proud of himself for a lot of the stuff he's done in order to work off that guilt? the biggest giveaway for that being the line in endwalker on the ragnarok where he talks about his "good deeds" cynically and seems to insist that they were never really that impactful in the first place. that they'll just go to dust when he dies.

in shb, during the ahm areng segment, not only does he talk down on himself in general, but also puts down his attempts to help OG minfilia back in the pre-ARR days... when i'm pretty sure she never even blamed him for the goobue rampage in the first place.

it's all a little bit sad to me, tbh. i've seen some people reason that, because he was only able to escape poverty due to louisoix seeing potential in his thieving skills, he's essentially internalized the idea that he's only really worth keeping around by ANYONE if he's actively being productive, either helping others or trying to fix whatever fuckups he feels he's made. i think that would explain a lot of this

note the "few positive traits" line, which to me comes across as "i was only picked up out of childhood poverty because he thought my skills were useful." though i don't really know how much of that mentality he's managed to work past by post endwalker. he IS able to go off on his own, and mentions that he trusts the scions to keep themselves safe now... but as i ranted about before, the short story points out that he's only really content to rest briefly before he feels obligated again to seek out unrest to try and help, specifically mentioning minfilia again. also, a couple times during the story, notably post ARR after his possession, mid SHB after he's wounded in a fight with sineaters, and post SHB after he passes out due to the weakening soul-body bond, he seems to dislike even having to rest for medical reasons

it's a pretty interesting part of his character to me. idk if the writers specifically had his rigorous upbringing in mind when they wrote these parts of his character, but to me it would make a lot of sense as an explanation for why he's so averse to rest and why he carries so much guilt and why he's so passionate about keeping the folks around him safe. that's kinda been his whole reason for life since he was a kid-- using his skills for the benefit of others. to him, doing anything other than that would be a waste, it seems.

idk. funny guy makes my heart hurt. yes i had all these dialogue screencaps saved and on hand. yes i am a little insane. what of it

[pinkrelish]

𝐰𝐢𝐬𝐡 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐰𝐞𝐫𝐞 𝐡𝐞𝐫𝐞.

bestfriend!eddie x fem!reader

✶ Dreams were meant to die in small towns like Hawkins. No amount of hours bleeding on the balance beam would pull you out of poverty and turn you into the gymnastics star your mother wanted. Some days, when it was just you and Eddie hanging out in the field behind his trailer, or in his room; it didn't matter. But, one day, an opportunity presented itself, and it's one Eddie would never forget. Nor forgive. ✶

NSFW — angst, eventual smut, best friends to enemies to lovers, slow burn, mutual pining, drug/alcohol mention/use, disordered eating by proxy of parent, depictions of poverty

chapter: 1/15 [wc: 2.7k]

↳ part 01 / 02 / 03 / 04 / 05 / 06 / 07 / 08 / 09 / 10 / 11

AO3

Chapter 1: Eddie's Favorite Memory

——1979——

Alone in his room, Eddie plucked the worn strings of his cheap acoustic guitar along to the music playing through his stereo, learning the song by ear. Missing a few notes, he lifted the needle off the record and dropped it back in place at the beginning, but as he did so, another sound caught his attention.

Was today the day?

He raced to the door. The trailer shook as he went, rattling the beginnings of his father’s eccentric mug collection hung on the wall. He threw the screen door open with such vigor it smacked the aluminum siding and wobbled on its hinges. Up the unpaved street, dirt clouds trailed a car like the flaming wings of a chariot.

The red Ford Pinto rolled to a stop in front of his home, and much to his disappointment, it was only the mail lady driving with her leg straddling the center console to control the pedals and her arm stretched across to the steering wheel, nearly running him over. She didn’t say anything; she merely continued to chew her gum and motion for him to take the tiny cardboard box from her hand.

Eddie snatched it and read the label. “Maybe today won’t be so shit.”

She scowled. “Cool it on the cursing, kid.”

He waited until she reversed onto the main road and drove away to flip two glaring birds in her rearview mirror. “Whatever, bitch.” Excited to rip open his package, he shredded it down the middle and tossed aside the bubble wrap.

A gust picked up the rustling plastic.

Rocks crunched under car tires behind him.

“I can’t believe it actually came,” he spoke aloud with raised eyebrows. He opened the plastic casing and inspected the clear cassette, looking over the handwritten tracklist on the inside. Weighing it in his hand, he reasoned with himself, “I must not be tempted to listen to this before she–”

“Eddie!”

He nearly dropped the treasure he’d been anticipating since he met that weird old man at the flea market who swore Eddie’s $5 could get him a bootleg live recording of Pink Floyd’s Oakland concert from two years ago. Of course he paid and jotted down his address without a second thought.

“Eddie!” you shouted again, jumping out of the moving car because you couldn’t wait for your mom to park in the dead grass next to the trailer across the street. You scooped him into a bone-crushing hug, extending your back to lift him off the ground. At least, you thought you did, until his Converse nudged your toes, firmly on the ground.

He grew another damn inch.

Cackling at your pitiful efforts, he mocked you, “That’s what happens when you’re gone too long.”

“It was only a month,” you grumbled.

Eddie wrapped his arms around you, clasping his forearms across the span of your shoulders. Holding you tighter than he meant to since he was still regaining his balance..

No. He did intend to embrace you until you laughed in his ear, telling him it hurt.

It was unfortunate; the impending societal awareness that crept into every innocuous action, every clothing choice, every decision to buy nice-smelling shampoos, or forgo them in lieu of generic deodorant. It existed in his muscles tensing you against him. It spelled trouble in his sandy blond hair darkening, and the wispy growth above his top lip thickening. No one could point out the exact time in a young person’s life when it became inappropriate to hug your best friend, but he was on the cusp of discovering it with how your mother stared him down from behind your back.

Smoke billowed in front of her face. “Be back for dinner,” your mom muttered around the half-burnt cigarette between her lips. Grabbing her gaudy purse and empty beer can from the dash, she used her hip to close the door, and went inside to pass out on the couch for the rest of the day.

“Whaddya get?”

“Hm?” Eddie blinked away his glare and separated himself from you, putting a significant distance between you. “Oh, ho! You have spotted my newest acquisition. Delivered by boat just this morn’.”

You pulled a grimace. “Talk normal, please.” Smirking, he flipped the cover of the cassette towards you. “Shit!” You covered your mouth. “Oops..” After a thought, you shook your head and relaxed your shoulders, knowing your mom couldn’t hear you out here. Still, you kept your voice down out of instinct. “Are you fucking serious? I’ve wanted to listen to this concert for so long; I can’t believe you just– Wait.. You don’t even like Pink Floyd that much. You said they’re too ‘soft.’”

“Yeah, but you like them.”

“But it’s your birthday.”

“Who cares?”

“Was it expensive?”

Again, he said, “Who cares?”

You scanned the rundown trailer park. “Uh, we do?”

Fluttering his fingers about, he waved off your incessant questioning. “What’s with the third degree? Are we listening to it, or not?”

“Duh,” you scoffed. You headed for his room, assuming you would play it on his tape deck, but of course, he had something else up his torn sleeve. You almost ran face-first into his outstretched arms stopping you from taking another step. “What now?”

“Wait out back in our spot. I have another surprise.. And you wouldn’t happen to have two double AA batteries, would you?”

~~~

After several minutes, and many, many, uses of the Lord’s name in vain later, Eddie found what he was looking for in his messy closet and bolted outside to meet you. He waded through an endless sea of wispy dry weeds parting the horizon from the deteriorating trailers to the edge of the woods where the top of your head poked above the grass. You gave him time to settle in next to you before you were laying down on the slope of the withered ditch littered with remnants of previous misadventures.

“Look,” he said. You opened your eyes to mostly a view of his ratty jacket overtop his Judas Priest tee. He flaunted the box over your face. “A gift from my old man. He thought I turned thirteen in June.”

You gave him a look. “A gift, huh?”

He opened the blue and silver metal Sony Walkman by slicing down the middle of the hefty price sticker with a pocket knife and bounced his eyebrows. “He got it for me the day it came out while you were gone.” As if it weren’t obvious, he wiggled his five fingers.

“I got it, Eddie.”

Clearly having a disdain for the environment, he lobbed the styrofoam trash amongst the other trash partially petrified in the mud; cigarette stubs, crushed cans, the odd broken plastic item, a bent butter knife, an old lighter, a pile of burnt magazine pages; truly random things. He placed the batteries in the Walkman, put in the tape, and scrolled the volume wheel all the way up.

Faint music played from the tiny earmuffs. He laid next to you, and without discussing it, he flipped the headphones upside down and you both rolled onto your sides, cupping one side each around your ears. Leaning your heads together to listen to the beginning chords of Pink Floyd’s Sheep.

In the early golden sunset, Eddie asked amongst the calm, “How was gymnastics camp? Learn any new tricks?”

“I landed a handspring front layout into a double twist.”

“I have no idea what that means, but I’m gathering it’s impressive,” he said, brimming with a toothy grin to match your own.”

“Yeah, it’s pretty good.”

“Will I be getting an invite to the Olympics?”

You rolled your eyes in a playful way; however, he perceived the flicker of resentment lurking in the background, and it was impossible to ignore how quickly your smile faded considering how close your lips were to his. “Like hell they’d come to some place like Indiana, much less Hawkins, to scout talent. They go to big meets in big cities. Doesn’t matter anyway, you know they don’t bother with people like us who can’t afford to keep the lights on at the start of the month, or whose water pipes smell like rotten eggs on the regular.” Not exactly a funny statement, but he snorted at the accuracy. With a defeated sigh, you turned onto your back and folded your arms across your chest. The hem of your tattered shirt slid against your leotard, revealing the shimmery fabric under the fading sky. “Besides, they want girls younger than me, better than me.”

“Damn. And I thought I was supposed to be the pessimistic one.”

“You’re right.” You gave him an apologetic look. “I’ll join the circus instead. Anyway, how was your summer?”

“Boring. We put together a song or three,” he said about his band. “Third one isn’t anything worth bragging about. It’s still in the jamming stage. Another session and it’ll be shaped into something presentable, maybe.”

“Nice, can’t wait to hear it.”

You bumped fists and resumed focusing on the concert playing in a suboptimal manner, of which neither of you could fully enjoy. It would’ve been easier to stay inside and play it over the stereo, singing along to the lyrics while you sat on his bed, and he on the floor. But inside meant being reachable by phone. Inside meant parental intervention. Inside meant being controlled.

Outside sucked, too. There were bugs, the grass was itchy, and a chill was creeping in. But no one could find you out here. This sanctuary belonged to you and Eddie. No one else.

In this substantial field, there was only space for you and him. Just you and him. Like always.

Coming to life at the end of a song, you jabbed his hand holding the Walkman. “Rewind it. Play Wish You Were Here again.”

“Jesus, corpses have warmer hands than you,” he hissed, obeying your request and hitting the rewind and play buttons. Then, he sat up and shrugged his jacket off, being gentle where he pulled at the cuffs due to the holes he’d worn in them. He dropped it on top of you. You opened your mouth, ready to refuse, and he shook his head. “You can keep it.” Keep it. Wear it often. Occupy yourself by snuggling into his warmth, because even in the pitch black night, he swore the stars would rat out his burning cheeks.

The Walkman clicked. The tape stopped whirring, at its end.

Holding shy eye contact in the sliver of moonlight, he laid back down.

Play it again.

Click.

Play it again.

Click.

Play it again.

The recording wasn’t a high grade one. It had static interference, there were loud thuds that scared the both of you the first time they happened, but.. This is where you wanted to be. Where he wanted to be. Propped cheek to fist, idly shoveling dirt with your fingers until your eyelids drifted closed. Obligations, anxieties, fears did not exist in the comfort of one another’s presence.

Click.

You interrupted the sleepy cricket’s song, “I guess it’s time for me to go home.”

“Doesn’t have to be,” he whispered.

“She’s easier to deal with when I’m only two hours late,” you said, standing up, putting on his jacket. “Wanna come over for dinner?” Your sarcasm could be detected for miles.

“I have a box of stale cereal with my name on it, but thank you for the gracious invitation, oh Benevolent One.”

He performed a waist-deep bow. You curtsied.

Giggling, you walked away and promised you’d see each other tomorrow. “Bright and early, Munson! Maybe even before noon this time.”

“Ab-so-lutely not!” he yelled back, biting his lip to rid himself of the widest smile he’d had all summer. How could he not smile when you were back?

In fact, he couldn’t imagine a world in which he wouldn’t smile this big when you were next to him.

~~~

Daring to open the creaky front door, you knew not to expect the savory waft of cooked food, but the sting of alcohol in your nose was stronger than usual. More powerful than the usual rank mildewy smell of dust-covered garbage. The TV was blaring. Your mom was slouched into the corner of the couch; an opened six pack beside her and a bottle of spirits tilted in her hand. Her glazed over eyes were watching the news, though you suspected she was taking none of it in.

Your senses were on high alert. If you were quiet, meek like a mouse, you may be able to–

“Uh-uh.” Your body responded to her voice on instinct, closing the refrigerator. “No dinner. Not until your sets of fifty.” She snapped repeatedly and pointed at the middle of the floor where normal families had a coffee table. “Crunches, sit-ups, push-ups, whatever else Coach said. You looked sloppy next to that Level 10 girl, and it won’t happen again. Now.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“And take off that jacket. It smells like pot. People will get the wrong idea about you.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

——1985——

As if your heart wasn’t in your throat already, your stomach churned and sank the moment you saw the Forest Hills Trailer Park sign.

Broken out in cold sweat. Wet palms struggling to turn the thin steering wheel towards the set of two trailers across from each other at the end of the lot. Shaking to the brink of exhaustion. You ran on black coffee and the pure adrenaline of almost hitting enough deer, it made you think twice about crying when Bambi’s mother died.

The car engine purred as you sat there thinking about why you were here again. Not a nice purr of a kitten, more like a sickly lion locked a zoo that needed to be put down a year ago.

Sucking in a breath, you decided to get it over with. You grabbed the white envelope in the passenger’s seat and stepped out into the sun, squinting. The stairs to the front door were concrete. An upgrade from the weathered wood they used to be. The screen door was missing–ripped off its hinges, so you knocked on the main one; it sounded hollow and metallic. Nostalgic in a way.

The knob turned.

“Oh, God,” you exhaled at the peephole.

When the door was replaced by someone other than the person you were expecting, you assumed your face painted in dread did wonders to alleviate his equally confused expression.

“Boy, I haven’t seen you in a long time, Girlie.”

“Mr. Munson!” You brightened upon seeing Eddie’s uncle. Relieved, actually. “How have you been?”

His grayed mustache lifted at the corners, showing off his teeth in a rather innocent way despite his gruff exterior. “Could be better, could be worse.” There was a deep grog to his voice, having just been disturbed from sleeping off his night shift at the plant. “You lookin’ for Eddie?”

“Yeah, is he here?”

He rocked his head back and forth as any guardian would when speaking about their miscreant nephew with a twinkle in their eye. “He should be in summer school right now, which is to say, he’s probably out getting into trouble. At the Hideaway, maybe? Or getting high with one of his friends, but don’t ask me where.” He sucked his teeth and crossed his arms.

“School?” you lead, an airy warble of optimism present in your voice.

Sighing, he delivered you the bad news upfront and honestly. “High school. He failed senior year.. again.”

Any hope he meant something different died. “Ah,” you said. “Well, uh.. Could you give this to him in case I don’t run into him?” You handed him the white envelope you spent far too long writing Eddie’s name on.

“Sure can.”

“Thank you.”

“It was good seeing you, again.. If you do run into him, I.. Well.” He paused to organize his thoughts. “Now, I don’t know what happened between you kids, but I hope you do find him.”

Taking his parting words as rather ominous, you nodded and hopped back in your Ford Pinto, beginning your search for Eddie.

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Poor people pay higher time tax

Doubtless you’ve heard that “we all get the same 24 hours in the day.” Of course it’s not true: rich people and poor people experience very different demands on their time. The richer you are, the more your time is your own — not only are many systems arranged with your convenience in mind, but you also command the social power to do something about systems that abuse your time.

If you’d like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here’s a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/02/10/my-time/#like-water-down-the-drain

For example: if you live in most American cities, public transit is slow, infrequent and overcrowded. Without a car, you lose hours every day to a commute spent standing on a lurching bus. And while a private car can substantially shorted that commute, people who can afford taxis or Ubers get even more time every day.

There’s a thick anthropological literature on the ways that cash-poverty translates into #TimePoverty. In David Graeber’s must-read essay “The Utopia of Rules,” he nails the way that capitalist societies generate Soviet-style bureaucracies, especially for poor people. Means-testing for benefits means that poor people spend endless hours filling in forms, waiting on hold, and lining up to see caseworkers to prove that they are among the “deserving poor” — not “mooches” who are defrauding the system:

https://memex.craphound.com/2015/02/02/david-graebers-the-utopia-of-rules-on-technology-stupidity-and-the-secret-joys-of-bureaucracy/

The social privilege gradient is also a time gradient: if you can afford a plane ticket, you can travel quickly across the country rather than losing days to the Greyhound or a road-trip. But if you’re even richer, you can pay for TSA Precheck and cut your airport security time from an hour to minutes. Go further up the privilege gradient and you’ll acquire airline status, shaving another hour off the check-in process.

This qualitative account of time poverty is well-developed, but it’s lacked a good, detailed quantitative counterpart, and our society often discounts qualitative work as mere anecdote and insists on having every story converted to numbers before it is taken seriously.

In “Examining inequality in the time cost of waiting,” published this month in Nature Human Behavior, public affairs researchers Steve Holt (SUNY) and Katie Vinopal (Ohio State) analyze data from the American Time Use Survey (AUTS) to produce a detailed, vibrant quantitative backstop to the qualitative narrative about time poverty:

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41562-023-01524-w

(The paper is paywalled, but the authors made a mostly final preprint available)

https://osf.io/preprints/socarxiv/jbk3x/download

The AUTS “collects retrospective time diary data from a nationally representative subsample drawn from respondents to the Census Bureau’s Community Population Survey (CPS) each year.” These time-diary entries are sliced up in 15-minute chunks.

Here’s what they found: first, there are categories of basic services where high-income people avoid waiting altogether, and where low-income people experience substantial waits. A person from a low-income household “an hour more waiting for the same set of services than people from high-income household.” That’s 73 hours/year.

Some of that gap (5%) is attributable to proximity. Richer people don’t have to go as far to access the same services as poorer people. Travel itself accounts for 2% more — poorer people wait longer for buses and have otherwise worse travel options.

A larger determinant of the gap (25%) is working flexibility. Poor people work jobs where they have less freedom to take time off to receive services, so they are forced to take appointments during peak hours.

Specific categories show more stark difference. If a poor person and a wealthy person go to the doctor’s on the same day, the poor person waits 46.28m to receive care, while the wealthy person waits 28.75m. The underlying dynamic here isn’t hard to understand. Medical practices that serve rich people have more staff.

The same dynamic plays out in grocery stores: poor people wait an average of 24m waiting every time they go shopping. For rich people, it’s 15m. Poor people don’t just wait in longer lines — they also have to wait for understaffed stores to unlock the cases that basic necessities are locked behind (poor people also travel longer to get to the grocery store — and they travel by slower means).

A member of a poor household with a chronic condition that requires two clinic visits per month loses an additional five hours/year to waiting rooms when compared to a wealthy person. As the authors point out, this also translates to delayed care, missed appointments, and exacerbated health conditions. Time poverty leads to health poverty.

All of this is worse for people of color: “Low-income White and Black Americans are both more likely to wait when seeking services than their wealthier same-race peer” but “wealthier White people face an average wait time of 28 minutes while wealthier Black people face a 54 minute average wait time…wealthier Black people do not receive the same time-saving attention from service providers that wealthier non-Black people receive” (there’s a smaller gap for Latino people, and no observed gap for Asian Americans.)

The gender gap is more complicated: “Low-income women are 3 percentage points more likely than low-income men and high-income women are 6 percentage points more likely than high-income men to use common services” — it gets even worse for low-income mothers, who take on the time-burdens associated with their kids’ need to access services.

Surprisingly, men actually end up waiting longer than women to access services: “low-income men spend about 6 more minutes than low-income women waiting for service…high-income men spend about 12 more minutes waiting for services than high-income women.”

Given the important role that scheduling flexibility plays in the time gap, the authors propose that interventions like subsidized day-care and afterschool programming could help parents access services at off-peak hours. They also echo Graeber’s call for reduced paperwork burdens for receiving benefits and accessing public services.

They recommend changes to labor law to protect the right of low-waged workers to receive services during off-peak hours, in the manner of their high-earning peers (they reference research that shows that this also improves worker productivity and is thus a benefit to employers as well as workers).

Finally, they come to the obvious point: making people less cash-poor will alleviate their time-poverty. Higher minimum wages, larger earned income tax credits, investments in low-income neighborhoods and better public transit will all give poor people more time and more money with which to command better services.

This week (Feb 13–17), I’ll be in Australia, touring my book Chokepoint Capitalism with my co-author, Rebecca Giblin. We’re doing a remote event for NZ on Feb 13. Next are Melbourne (Feb 14), Sydney (Feb 15) and Canberra (Feb 16/17). More tickets just released for Sydney!

[Image ID: A waiting room, draped with cobwebs. A skeleton sits in one of the chairs. A digital display board reads 'Now serving 53332.' An ogrish, top-hatted figure standing at a podium, yanking a dollar-sign shaped lever looms into the frame from the right. He holds a clock aloft disdainfully, pinched between the thumb and fingers of one white-gloved hand.]