From: Barbara Lamar (barbaralamar@sanmarcos.net)
Date: Sat Aug 23 2003 - 12:13:25 MDT
Spike wrote:
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Robbie Lindauer
>
>
> ...Now two family members must work to support a family of
> four. Then only 1...
>
>
> Depends on what you mean by the term "support". If
> one is satisfied with the standard of living they
> had "then," one minimum salary is way more than sufficient
> to make it happen.
Spike, I agree with you in theory. After all, I raised my daughter on
approximately $6000 per year. BUT! I started out already owning a tract of
land (in a remote location where no building codes were enforced), a pickup
truck, and some power tools. And I was able to earn my pittance at the rate
of $85 - $175 per hour (depending on the sort of work I was doing). So I had
plenty of time left over to scrounge free building materials, plan and
construct buildings, plan and install gardens, and so forth.
I challenge you, Spike -- I'm not kidding, this is an honest-to-dog
challenge -- next time you can take six months off from work, go out and try
living at the lower end of the economic scale. Here are the rules:
1. You cannot rely on your higher education or professional experience.
2. You have to leave your vehicle(s), credit cards, nice clothing, etc. at
home.
3. You cannot take money from your bank account via ATM, online or through
any other means. The only way you're allowed to get money is to earn it or
obtain it through begging. (by the way, I've been told by people who know
from first-hand experience that for the short term, you can do better by
begging than by getting a minimum wage job -- if you can position yourself
at a good intersection that isn't already controlled by others; you'll
probably find that the best locations are already staked out, and if you try
to set yourself up there, you'll be run off by the existing "owners"; but
you might be able to cut a deal with them where you'll pay them a certain
amount of rent each day for the privilege of using their intersection.)
4. You have to live like this for a minimum of six months.
Since almost everyone has a little money and a few possessions, you can take
the following with you when you leave home:
-- $1000 in cash (this is an *extremely* generous start-up allowance,
roughly equivalent to a month's take home pay for a minimum wage earner).
I'm setting it this high so you can make some purchases to get yourself even
with where a mimum wage earner might be at any given time (e.g. you could
purchase cookware, dishes, a few changes of clothing, toothbrush, safety
razors, materials to make a sign for begging (you can find cardboard or
pieces of plywood lying around, but you'll probably have to buy markers or
paint); if you choose to try to grow some food you could buy a few gardening
tools. But it takes approximately two years to get a "raw" piece of land
into condition to give you a high yield per square foot, and you'll have to
figure out some way to get compostable material to your garden plot (if you
can somehow find a garden plot -- most land owners won't let you use their
land, even if it's just sitting there vacant, because they want to be able
to maintain it by running a mower over it). A couple hundred bucks will go a
long way at garage sales or thrift shops; the problem will likely be getting
yourself to the garage sales and shops and getting the stuff to its ultimate
destination without a vehicle; you'll have to consider your purchases
carefully, as you will have spent most of your starting allowance on
housing -- unless of course you choose to live on the streets; and you'll
want to keep something for food, at least enough to live on until you can
get familiar with the best dumpsters -- but again, these will probably
already be claimed (you have to hit them at the right time of day, else all
you'll find is inedible garbage), and you'll have to come up with some sort
of strategy to get a share).
-- You glasses, if you need them (if you wear contacts, I would suggest
leaving these at home, since keeping them clean can be a problem if you're
living on the streets) and any medications you need (a *real* minimum wage
earner would probably not have the medication and might therefore be in
poorer health than you will be)
If you think the above rules are grossly unfair, feel free to suggest
changes, but the point is to start out with nothing more than the average
minimum wage earner would have at any one time.
I know it could be done, and you're probably smart enough to do just fine;
but I suspect you'd find it a lot more difficult than you anticipated.
I like to go for long walks, and I sometimes find myself hungry and thirsty
and rather far from home, with no money or credit cards. Although in the
city one can usually find an outdoor faucet from which one can drink, and
there are almost always edible plants growing wild in vacant lots and even
in cracks in the pavement, it's awfully hard to find anything with
substantial calories free for the taking.
> We expect more now, so it should
> come as no surprise that it costs more.
This is not entirely accurate, Spike. There are plenty of people (I speak
from first hand knowledge here, having interacted with such people and
having *been* one from time to time) who would be happy to live in the
simplest of dwellings. But city codes won't allow it. For example, to take
the electrical code alone -- these days in Luling, Texas, a small laid back
place where the codes tend to be less stringent than in the Big City, you
have to have (among many, many other things) a separate A/C circuit
dedicated to the smoke alarm system; arc fault circuit interrupters in every
bedroom; ground fault circuit interrupters every place there is a countertop
(regardless of whether said countertop is located in a "wet" area); and you
are required to install an electrical outlet at least every x feet (can't
recall exact figure, but it's pretty low; in other words, you're required to
put in lots of electrical outlets) throughout the dwelling, except in
storage areas). These items alone, if installed by a licensed electrician,
would cost more than the typical minimum wage earner would have to spend on
a house. Some counties have less expensive standards outside city limits,
but the typical minimum wage earner does not have access to a reliable
vehicle on a regular basis; and there aren't many jobs to be had in rural
areas, nor is it easy to get regular work as an independent contractor. So
they're pretty much stuck with living in town. For those a bit higher up the
economic ladder, there are mobile and manufactured homes. In central Texas
(where the cost of living and wages are somewhat below the national average)
the typical new mobile or manufactured home will cost more than $50,000 at
the *low* end for a 2-bedroom model (and of course, that cost does not
include the land and utility hookups). You can buy a really raunchy used
mobile home for under $3000, but you still have to buy land and pay for
moving and setup (the moving and set up will generally be *at least* a
thousand, and that's if you already have utilities hooked up and a septic
system in place; a septic system will cost you anywhere from $5000 to
$20,000+).
> One needn't even work: standing on a city streetcorner
> with a "Will Not Work for Anything" sign will get you
> all the donations needed to survive.
The only reason this works for some is that most people don't do it. Why
don't they do it? The main reasons, aside from pride, are: 1. there are
only so many good begging locations per city, and these are generally
already taken; 2. One can do it for only so long before developing
respiratory and other health problems from breathing car exhaust for hours
each day -- and you do have to keep at it for several hours to get enough to
survive on, especially if you have kids to support; 3. Most cities have
ordinances that don't allow the solicitation of charitable contributions
without a permit.
Also, bare survival isn't enough if you have children. All states in the
U.S. have laws that allow the state to take away one's children and put them
into foster care if the parent is not maintaining living conditions for the
children that meet minimum state standards. The state standards require a
dwelling that meets city codes.
> Today you can earn enough to support yourself in
> a similar manner by working only a few months.
> Look around you, Robbie. Farmland is as cheap as,
> well, dirt. It costs practically nothing.
"Practically nothing" is quite relative. You can pick up land in the middle
of the desert for just a few bucks an acre, but most tracts of land on the
market are in the thousands of acres. Small tracts cost more per acre,
because you're paying for the costs of subdividing, plus the seller's cut
for putting the deal together, plus the agent's cut for marketing the land.
So you might end up paying $3000 for a five acre tract, but you'd get a
piece of land fifty or a hundred miles from the nearest town with no
water -- useless for anything other than sort-term recreational camping.
> But there is little need for all that effort. Most
> farmers will let poor people glean the fields after
> a harvest today
Even if this were so (and usually it's not), how one is to live for a year
on a grocery bag full of gleaned milo? Even supposing you could somehow
glean a year's worth of calories (for a small active person that would be
more than 6000 potatoes or the equivalent in some other crop -- [2500
calories per day / 150 calories per potato x 7 days/week x 52 weeks/year]).
Where, pray tell, are you going to store 6000 potatoes? Remember, food
production is seasonal.
One can actually glean a lot more food in cities than on the farm. Grocery
store and restaurant dumpsters are rich sources; and one can get
supplemental protein by trapping rodents and birds and eating insects (if
one can develop a taste for them, insects are probably the most efficient
sources of protein).
Long as you've got a digestive system of iron and you aren't too picky, you
can eat. The greatest problem is finding shelter. Most cities don't take
kindly to people camping out under freeways and in public parks.
> There is plenty of land in the U.S. which cannot
> be farmed *profitably* for various reasons, but
> which is still perfectly farmable for food production
> on a family scale, as demonstrated by the Amish.
The following items, possessed by the Amish, would cumulatively cost
thousands of dollars for the person just starting out: wagons and horses or
mules (or the internal combustion, steam, or electric equivalent) for
hauling compost, building materials, harvested food and so forth;
water-tight and pest-proof structures for food storage; fencing for farm
animals and to keep critters out of gardens (this is not a trivial expense);
source of water and means of getting water to where it's needed; shelter for
humans and farm animals; means of heating shelters in cold weather; tools
for cultivating land, constructing buildings, chopping and splitting wood,
etc.
Barbara Lamar
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