this post was submitted on 10 Nov 2023
1759 points (97.2% liked)

Work Reform

9980 readers
155 users here now

A place to discuss positive changes that can make work more equitable, and to vent about current practices. We are NOT against work; we just want the fruits of our labor to be recognized better.

Our Philosophies:

Our Goals

founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
 
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (2 children)

You don't have to "spend" all your money. Live frugally, invest the rest, then retire early or donate it or something. Spending your whole paycheck is very bad at any income level, but it turns out when you're poor you don't get a choice.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago (1 children)

When you don't make enough to survive, spending your whole paycheck is not bad because that is all you have.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Yeah that's why I wrote that.

Spending your whole paycheck is very bad at any income level, but it turns out when you’re poor you don’t get a choice.

[–] [email protected] -2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

It is NOT bad though. That is very judgemental.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago (1 children)

It is objectively bad. Spending your whole paycheck means you live month-to-month, and any unexpected expenses can and will sink you and send you into further poverty. It is not financially healthy to live without an emergency fund or investment savings for the future. Just because you do not have enough money to accomplish this doesn't mean it's not bad.

I'm not intending to be "judgmental" while saying this - it's important to recognize the problems that poverty causes.

[–] [email protected] -2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

They ARE living paycheck to paycheck, and most likely not by choice.

Not having enough income to save is a bad situation. The act of spending all of your paycheck so you can eat and survive IS NOT BAD.

Saying someone that is forced to live paycheck to paycheck that they are making a bad decision by eating is a very dickish thing to do.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

At this point you are intentionally misreading the word "bad" to mean "bad decision" instead of "bad situation". I've already explicitly explained that's not what I meant so I don't know what you want me to reply with.

[–] [email protected] -3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

One thing that conservatives like to do is act like poor people who spend all their money and don't save are making the decision to do so instead of acknowledging the situation. They equate any level of income and whether or not all of the money is spent, using the same phrasing that you are using to say that spending all the money is bad. Adding a qualifier at the end that they don't have a choice but still saying it is bad implies that they are making a choice which just opens up more room for nitpicking on how they spend their money.

"Being forced to live paycheck to paycheck is bad because there is no ability to save for emergencies" means they are not doing a bad thing because it is about the situation. Focus on the inability to save, not that they spent all their money.

Put the bad label on the situation, not the action that is the result of the situation.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Your specific strawman of how you choose to read what I wrote is what you're fighting right now. I've clarified myself a non-zero number of times, which is more than necessary. If you want to write about this topic start a new post, because it's not related to what I said.

[–] [email protected] -2 points 1 year ago

Not listening to constructive criticism is bad.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

You don’t have to “spend” all your money

.

Spending your whole paycheck is very bad at any income level, but it turns out when you’re poor you don’t get a choice.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

Hi, the first snippet is in response to the commenter's quote: "I don’t want to be filthy rich because I think I’d do a lot of dumb things more than I would doing charitable things."

To which I replied that being rich doesn't mean they need to spend all their money.