'I have shop-lifted to feed my family': Dr Liz Allen on the shame of poverty, and the life lessons it has taught her
www.abc.net.au
For Pay Day, demographer and social researcher Dr Liz Allen shares the shame that comes with living in poverty, the secrets of survival, and how this experience "grants perspective that can never be bought".

This bit resonated.

It makes me so terribly sad that in a society such as ours the wealthy keep creating new means to harm the less lucky.

That aside, Alan Kholer has also opined in the past that our economics policy is based on disdain.

I know many will read my financial experiences and see failure. I haven’t failed; I succeeded when the odds were totally stacked against me. I made good what life threw at me. I survived … with my values intact.

I can only agree.

    • Ilandar@aussie.zone
      6·
      5 months ago

      You can’t have a disabled child without first choosing to have a child.

      No birth control is 100% effective.

      Are you really pretending this woman accidentally found herself pregnant on 7 occasions? And that on each occasion, she accidentally had the child without ever making a choice to keep it instead of pursuing an abortion? And that nowhere, throughout any of these 7 births, was she ever in control of her life to the extent that she could have made choices that led her down an entirely different path?

      • funkless_eck@sh.itjust.works
        22·
        5 months ago

        why is having kids wasting money, but a medical procedure such as abortion not a waste of money? what value is generated from the abortion?

        • 𝚝𝚛𝚔@aussie.zoneEnglish
          31·
          5 months ago

          I feel like you’re arguing for the sake of arguing. Nothing you’re saying makes sense beyond being contrite.

          • funkless_eck@sh.itjust.works
            21·
            5 months ago

            no I’m arguing against the eugenics-based thought-terminating cliche that “poor people are poor because they have children” which is a nonsense.

            • 𝚝𝚛𝚔@aussie.zoneEnglish
              31·
              5 months ago

              How is it nonsense? You have a certain earning potential. If you choose to have 7 children, you both limit your earning potential due to the time investment of breeding and the need to spread your available income over more dependants. This isn’t some class warfare shit. Rich people can afford to have more children because they’re rich. We don’t start on a level playing field. There are exceptions of course but they are exactly that - exceptions.

        • Ilandar@aussie.zone
          1·
          5 months ago

          Firstly, I have never said children are a “waste” of money, I have only said that raising them impacts one’s financial situation.

          As for how the two are different: an abortion is a standalone cost. A child is an ongoing cost lasting at least 18 years, quite possibly much longer if one aspires to be a supportive parent.