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What I find so fascinating about this article is how it conveys the anxiety of being poor in America. How you're always one "bad luck" event from falling down a socio-economic peg, and recovering from that is so hard. Other places around the world, you're poor, but so's everyone else and you're all in it together.

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"What's more, the poor in other countries know that they are living in poor countries. They know that not only they but just about everyone is on the edge of starvation. The poor in the United States, on the other hand, are daily told on all sides that the United States is rich and wonderful. Movies and television constantly show them what happy lives other people are leading. The poor and hopeless are made to feel alone and imprisoned by misery in the midst of a victorious and wealthy and endlessly self-congratulating society." -- Isaac Asimov, "Just Say 'No'?"

I mean, I've been poor in Eastern Europe, and I've been poor in the US (had no idea!!!). I will take the U.S. poor every day of the week.

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