The concept of mystical experiences, which are often attributed to unexplained encounters and eerie coincidences, has been challenged by recent neuroscience and psychology research. Many mystical experiences in the modern world are “unchurched” or “unattached”, taking place unexpectedly and with no clear set and setting. William James’ 1902 study identified two essential characteristics of a mystical experience: ineffability and time-consciousness distortion.
Mystical experiences can occur spontaneously or be pharmacologically induced, and they are considered profound and pivotal events that can significantly influence an individual’s life. However, it is important to note that religious experiences can occur for both educated and uneducated individuals. Religious training or guidance does not guarantee that a person will have these experiences.
Highly educated Christians are more likely than less-educated Christians to say they are weekly churchgoers. The possible causes of these experiences must be carefully studied before conclusions can be drawn about them. Psilocybin, a drug that can occasion complete mystical experiences, is a common cause of these experiences.
Mystical experiences are intensely personal and use familiar symbolic language. They can occur spontaneously or be induced, and their effects are dose-dependent and specific to the individual. It is crucial to understand that mystical experiences are not exclusive to the educated or uneducated, but can occur for anyone.
📹 Why is it so hard to escape poverty? – Ann-Helén Bay
Explore the paradox of welfare programs, and learn how they inadvertently reinforce generational poverty, and what we can do to …
How do you know if you’re a mystic?
An ordinary mystic may experience moments of ego loss and absorption in the divine, such as feeling lifted out of one’s body and lost in beautiful art or nature. This can occur as a parent, creative person, or a creative person, and can lead to mystical moments that extend the boundaries of oneself and increase empathy with others.
If religion is defined as a strong sense of the divine, daily mysticism contributes to this sense by drawing one out of oneself and into nature and beyond. It is important to take these experiences seriously and make something of them, weaving them into one’s thinking, feeling, and relating. These experiences become part of one’s life and identity, leaving the mystic empty and lost in a positive way, yet alert and ready for the next revelation and opportunity.
Religion begins with the sense that life makes sense within a larger one, with a bond between oneself and the world, and that happiness depends on the happiness of the beings around them. The mystic may even realize that their soul participates in the world’s soul.
What causes mystical experiences?
Mystical experiences in reverie states can be triggered by the use of hallucinatory or psychedelic substances or drugs, such as ergot, LSD, peyote, San Pedro cactus, psilocybin-bearing mushrooms, and marijuana. These substances create alternate states of consciousness that may lead to mystical experiences through prayer, meditation, visualization, or other religious activity. The “Good Friday Experiment” in 1962, conducted by Walter Pahnke at Harvard University, established that when both mental and physical “setting” are arranged to encourage a mystical experience, it occurs with a 90% probability.
Set and setting influence the contents of all mystical techniques. Requiring would-be mystics to practice austerities and meditate for several years before attaining a mystical experience motivates them to have highly disciplined, doctrinally orthodox experiences. Providing easy access to mystical experiences necessitates greater doctrinal tolerance of varied experiences. William James introduced the term “overbeliefs” to explain the contents of mystical experiences that reflect doctrinal expectations rather than the immediate or spontaneous features of the experiences themselves.
Many auxiliary practices serve as overbeliefs, such as ethical behavior, doctrinal preparation, asceticism, gymnastics, isolation, diet, drumming, dance, and rituals. Another category of overbelief is a mystic’s emotional attachment to their teacher.
What are the four types of mystical experience?
Mysticism and religious experience are closely related but not identical. Mysticism is distinguished from numinous experiences, such as Rudolf Otto’s description, and ordinary experiences of God, illustrated by John Baillie. William James characterized mystical experience by four marks: transiency, passivity, noetic quality, and ineffability. It often involves an altered state of consciousness, such as trance, visions, suppression of cognitive contact with the ordinary world, loss of the usual distinction between subject and object, and weakening or loss of the sense of the self.
Much of this mystical experience is considered religiously significant by the subject, but there is a difficult question about whether all mysticism is inherently religious. Some mystical experiences are overtly theistic, having an ostensible reference to God and being dualistic, retaining the distinction between the mystic and the God who is ostensibly experienced. St Teresa of Avila, a Spanish Catholic of the sixteenth century, is an example of such a mystic. Other mystics, even within the Catholic tradition, tend towards monism, emphasizing the unity of all things and the lack of real distinctions between the mystic and divine reality.
Mysticism of the theistic, dualistic sort generates no particular difficulty for Christian metaphysics and often includes specifically Christian elements, such as visions of Christ. Strongly monistic mysticism is harder to square with a Christian view and is likely to find a more comfortable religious home in the great non-theistic religions.
In these experiences, the subject is strongly convinced that they are acquiring a piece of knowledge or revelation, which can be powerful convictions in their intellectual life. However, this way of assessing the significance of mysticism is not readily accessible to non-mystics, as these powerful convictions are typically generated by the experience itself.
What are the hallmarks of a mystical experience?
Mystical experience is a profound feeling of unity or interconnectedness, characterized by a core experience of unity. Stace provided one of the first comprehensive characterizations of mystical experience by analyzing religious texts and historical accounts, including personal narratives and biographical descriptions. He observed that mystical experiences were generally characterized by a profound feeling of unity or interconnectedness, with the core experience of unity being “the essence of all mystical experience”.
Stace proposed an organizational framework that included characteristics specific to either introvertive or extrovertive mystical experience, as well as characteristics that were common to both types of experiences. The nine characteristics identified by Stace included internal unity (undifferentiated awareness, unitary consciousness), external unity (a sense of unity with the surrounding environment), nontemporal and nonspatial quality (feelings of infinite time and limitless space), inner subjectivity (a sense of life or living presence in all things), objectivity and reality (a sense that the experience was a source of objective truth), sacredness (worthy of reverence, divine or holy), deeply felt peace and joy, paradoxicality (needing to use illogical or contradictory statements to describe the experience), and ineffability (difficulty of communicating or describing the experience to others).
Modern empirical study of mysticism has focused on characterizing mystical experiences that individuals have had across their lifetime. Hood’s Mysticism Scale, developed according to Stace’s framework, is the most widely used quantitative measure of mystical experience. However, recent reports suggest some cultural variation in the specific structure of mystical experience.
Mystical experiences can occur spontaneously or be generated or elicited through various rituals, substances, and induction methods. A modified single-experience version of the Mysticism Scale has been used to quantify mystical experiences that occur under naturalistic conditions, such as solitary wilderness expeditions.
How can you tell if someone is a mystic?
Mystics, as a term used to describe someone who is out of touch with reality, are actually those who have gotten in touch with what is real. They possess powerful receptivity and sympathy, are porous, and can stretch beyond their protective ego. They are often courageous and find ethical opportunities out of this wide stretch.
Other people can be ordinary mystics, experiencing moments of mystical moments that extend their boundaries and increase empathy with others. These moments can occur in various aspects of life, such as art, parenting, creativity, and personal growth. As the mystical moments multiply, individuals become less prone to self-protection and have a greater empathy for the world around them.
If religion is defined as a strong sense of the divine, daily mysticism contributes to this sense by drawing individuals out of themselves and into nature and beyond. This perspective highlights the importance of embracing the mystical moments and the potential for personal growth and connection with the divine.
How common are mystical experiences?
This study investigates the prevalence of Spiritual and Religious Experiences (SREs) in Brazil and their association with socio-demographic variables. A total of 1, 053 Brazilians were included, with 92 reporting one SRE in their lifetime and 47. 5 experiencing at least one frequently. Participants reported having at least one mystical experience, 27. 7 psi-related experiences, and 1 mediumistic experience. Half the sample had “felt the presence of a dead person” and 70 experienced precognitive dreams at least once.
SREs were associated with female gender but showed no associations with income, education, employment status, and ethnicity. Mystical experiences were associated with age 55 and older. SREs are very prevalent across different strata of the population and deserve more attention from researchers and clinicians to clarify their nature and implications for mental health care and research in Brazil.
What is the difference between a mystical experience and a psychotic experience?
The mystical experience enhances a person’s connection, love, and service, leading to a greater appreciation of life’s beauty and miracles. It also fosters reverence for all aspects of life and death. However, psychosis often leads to self-centeredness, limiting connection with the world and reducing love capacity due to the need to protect oneself from anxiety. This can result in a lack of psychic energy for love and survival. While some argue that Agosin’s distinctions between psychosis and mysticism are overly clear, his ideas provide a starting point for understanding the topic.
Susan Mitchell suggests that scholarly attempts to distinguish between psychotic and spiritual beliefs have been unsuccessful, suggesting that it may not be about what people believe but how they believe.
What is the personality of a female mystic?
Female mystics, who lived in their simple, unlearned lives, were vital to the church and society. They were committed to selfless humility, sharing their visions and inspiring a following of women. Despite the hysteria, asceticism, and suffering caused by their enlightenment, their vulnerability and self-punishment made them the preferred sex to receive God’s messages. In medieval times, female mysticism opened up a space for women to have a voice in society, despite their submission to the patriarchal system.
Medieval women were believed to be more in touch with their physical bodies, leading to much of their spirituality being rooted in embodiment. However, this association with the body also made them a liability due to the profane nature of the human body. Religious leaders and philosophers viewed the body as a vessel for the soul, with some believing it was intrinsically good and others viewing it as a prison for the soul.
These women’s unfaltering desire to please God motivated them to live selfless lives and spread goodness in the world. Their physical bodies trapped them in suffering, but their extreme self-control purified their souls. By resisting bodily temptations, the women proved their faith to God and forged a clearer path to salvation through severe self-discipline.
Which part of the brain is linked to mystical experiences?
Researchers have discovered that lesions in the frontal and temporal brain regions are linked to increased mystical experiences. They identified brain structures involved in these experiences by studying people with localized injuries. The frontal lobe regulates perceptual experiences, and when its inhibitory cognitive functions are suppressed, a “door of perception” opens, increasing the likelihood of mystical experiences. However, the study does not definitively resolve the ultimate reality of these experiences.
What is the mystical perception of knowledge?
Mystical experience and knowledge are interconnected, as they cannot be separated. Mystical knowledge is non-discursive, non-conceptual, and experiential, occurring in certain states of consciousness that are unmediated by mental processes or sense perception. It cannot be communicated due to its inability to be expressed in language or concepts. In Sufism, experiential knowledge is called “taste” (thawq), as it cannot be explained to someone who has never tasted one.
The possibility of mystical knowledge depends on our metaphysical positions. If we believe nothing transcends our material reality, we may not believe in mystical knowledge. The primary question is whether there is a transcendent reality to experience. Mystical epistemology can take one of two roots: affirmatively, grounded in metaphysical principles that explain these possibilities and justify the validity of mystical knowledge, or negatively, explaining mystical knowledge on material grounds and dismissing its validity.
What are the criteria for mystical experience?
The final phase of a mystical experience is characterized by a sense of ineffability, transcendence of time and space, a heightened perception of truth, a loss of control, intensified emotion, and a disruption in perception.
📹 Elon Musk: Does God Exist?
In this video, Elon Musk opens up about his religious believes and shares his thoughts on God and Jesus Christ. Enjoy!
I worked at mcdonalds in high school and college. I always, always had coworkers who would say they could not take any more hours because it would screw up their benefits (and while a reduction can hit immediately, an increase in benefits might take 6 months, so one anomalous paycheck could hit them particularly hard). BUT, these people frequently worked anyway, clocking out and taking home food in lieu of wages. Usually. Sometimes they just clocked out and kept working without the bonus food because they were worried about their job. I always had this story in rebuttal to anyone who said people on benefits were lazy. They were working, and working more than they were paid for.
That one frame at 1:53 when parent penguin is looking at the empty fridge and then at the expecting baby penguin broke my heart. Reminds me the same exact memory that’s burned in my brain from our poverty days and I was the baby. My family worked really hard to get us all out of that state. I’m thankful but also compassionate to anybody else who maybe struggling right now.
I used to work a full time job in Greece for EUR 420/ month. Just barely enough to live on, but I couldn’t afford rent, got support from my family. My next job actually paid enough that i could rent a house and live comfortably. I’m not the same person after that job. People that haven’t had this experience will never understand the anxiety that comes with it. Even i think i barely understand my past self.
This hit home…I remember being excited when I wouldn’t need assistance anymore. Until I finished paying bills. Then I wasn’t excited. Lived on white rice and salt for flavor for months. As I worked on very little food I lost weight and seemed to be weaker every week. My job got more difficult. I worked at a grocery store. I remember the exact day that I became hungry enough and desperate enough to steal food. I worked in the meat department and we threw away hundreds of pounds of meat every other day. Things that were close to date but perfectly fine. It was the week of Thanksgiving and we were getting our asses kicked. All I could think about was I was going to be eating white rice for Thanksgiving. I couldn’t take it anymore. I went to the throwaway cart, put a couple steaks under my beltline and punched for break. I walked straight to my car an put them in the trunk. (It was winter) To this day I don’t regret it. I was starving. Thank you past generations for the great place you left us 👍 Bang up job.
In Canada, when a person on welfare gets a job, their benefits are clawed back as a percentage of their income. A $500 increase in your income might result in a $100 decrease in your benefits, for example. This way, having a job is always better than not having one, and an increase in wages is always advantageous. Welfare benefits like free medication are also available until you reach a point where your welfare benefits reach 0, and you no longer need this help.
This is a reality for me, I don’t have to imagine this scenario. I live on SSI and I can’t get a job bc I’m disabled and I’m getting assistance for it, but it’s still hard. If I get a too good paying job, then I don’t get any gov’t assistance; if I don’t get a well paying job, then I still need go’t assistance. And for something that I can’t control; my disability.
I still remember the day, where I couldn’t find job so I was on government assistance, but when I told them I was planning to go to trade school they said well we can’t help, you either stay poor and no job or find a bare minimum job, in both situations I stayed poor, I was penalized because I wanted a better life. Keep in mind that trade school is very accessible and cheap, has high demand after you finish and it’s usually 2 years and under it means that if I was able to get help to finish that school it’s win for everyone but no, they want you to be poor. I eventually had to work illegally and get paid next to nothing just so I can finish school, was literally getting paid less than the government assistance just so I can go to school.
I am so immensely grateful for my parents. My dad was the only income and we were lower class barely making it through for a long time. After working for years he got the detrimental raises and promotions that finally let us live a very comfortable life in middle class. I am so grateful for the things he did to make sure I had a healthy and safe childhood.
I feel like they skipped over the “provide benefits like childcare, medical care, and education” part a little fast. There are some costs that really shouldn’t be shouldered by individuals at all. Most insurance should be public and universal, heath insurance particularly. Public transportation should be robust enough that people can get to their jobs without significant waits. There are all kinds of things that contribute to cost of living (and thereby poverty) that it would be more efficient and more beneficial to do at a community or societal level. Not to mention that taking such burdens off people gives them more time and energy to better themselves/look for better jobs/get promotions/raises. Climbing out of poverty is hard on its own, but there’s no reason people should have to do it with 20 pound weights around their ankles.
One thing that is generally ignored, swept under the rug, or not taken into consideration, is that benefits to the working poor are not so much a means of getting people back into the workforce as a means of subsidizing the rich by forcing the poor to accept starvation wages instead of forcing employers to pay First World wages in the First World countries where they make their money.
The issue and why even tho we know this won’t be enough to change it is the idea that profit wins over anything, neoliberalism is the idea that private corporations are the only ones that know how to get stuff done, it was pushed so hard that the only good education was private, good health care was private which are the main things that can change the future of a person. Suddenly you needed money to stop being poor and you remained poor for not being able to afford good education
The best way to understand poverty is by experience it yourself(I know, its not plausible). I live in rural poor neighborhood in developing/third world country, there is no solution as one size fit all, it depends on the people itself. Many people act like “woke” with this topic but doesn’t necessarily understand what it’s really like. Don’t get me wrong, it also apply to me. After all, we already have too much at hand to also care about other. Many believe we should educate instead of just giving money, but the truth is more practical than that and need immediate and direct measure that actually necessary to keep their live going. Poor people think short term(I don’t mean it as a bad thing, it’s just what’s necessary to them.
It must also be said that welfare benefits are especially vicious to disabled people. My mother is partially incapable of keeping a job due to mental issues, but doesn’t qualify for benefits because she’s been out of work for more than 5 years. Even if she were to get these benefits, as soon as she makes enough money, they would pull the rug out from under her, as if her mental issues didn’t exist. This is even more obvious for people with physical disabilities. Just because a disabled person is making a halfway decent amount of money, it doesn’t mean they can suddenly walk, or have typical motor control, or their brain suddenly just put all the wires in the same place as everyone else. They’re still disabled, and the cost of living for a disabled person is often much higher than the average person.
This article gives me so many thoughts, Born in a poor family teaches me how to use my money properly and learn how to escape the poverty, but somehow we can’t run away from it, at least now due to some reasons. Most of them are social benefits provided to working families and yes, both my parents are blue workers so they don’t receive any Government’s supplies
In Denmark 🇩🇰 we don’t have poverty at all. The government will take care of you if you lose your job. How? 1. Government will give you monthly salary of 1400$ after tax. That’s if you’re single. If you have a kid it will increase to 1700$ 2. They will help the citizen to apply for new job or an education. 3. They will give the citizen plenty of options to choose between jobs. – If you work, you’ll pay tax, when you pay tax you pay the government back and they pay you back again. All this with free healthcare and free education which is two of the most important aspects in life.
I grew up in poverty i hated it poverty is the worst dont wish it on my worst enemies i feel for all the people like me going through this even as a kid i struggled in life and got money anxiety from my upbringing cause most of my parents couldnt afford things and saved and we wirried about money alot i got depression early on as a child because of being in poverty because i didnt like being poor and was better off if i ended myself so i didnt have to worry about money its hard being poor to solve this poor people need to stop having kids thats why i dont have any if you do then the cycle continues yes its hard to get out of poverty compared someone who isnt but it takes alot of will power and resilience and discipline and to be educated on money
I remember when I had finally gotten a job that offered me more money. Employers had been paying me just above minimum wage despite the fact I was working in a professional field. That year, I not only lost assistance that helped me pay for daycare and food, but I had to start paying for health insurance so I was worse off than when I made less money per hour with no benefits. I lived this way for almost 5 years until I finally went up again in my income and got married (which helped me with daycare and the cost of living). During those years, I was always 1 paycheck away from eviction and had to skip on bills in order to buy food. It was the first time I had ever considered earning money through illegitimate means and possibly stripping just to buy Christmas and birthday presents. The only thing I learned from those days was how hard and unfair life can be and how cruel humans are.
i’m considered youth in Los Angeles and experiencing homelessness and there’s no help as of right now. Over 400+ places (including government officials) have let me know that nothings open. i’m sharing because i’m actively contacting others for help but for example—someone without a cellphone is going to have an even harder time applying.
I think we could break the cycle of poverty if we address ableism and the insane mass accumulation of wealth and resources certain individuals have because of inhumane unethical practices built on exploitation. Just saying. There is no “working out of poverty” when you can’t work…you are left to die.
I have recently fallen into homelessness. I still get help from the government and I’m lucky enough to have a warm place at enough, but I still can’t find a job nor find a new home to stay at. It’s a really difficult situation to get out of and most people at the local shelter have been there for years. I wish the government could help us more directly into recovering from this situation then actually just giving us money to get through the month and then tell us to just find a way on our own.
This is so true tho. I work making minimum wage, but with taxes it takes off so much. I get food stamps and free medical, but with me barely getting that many hours, i barely make it. I’ve been looking for a less physically demanding job for months and months, with no call backs or even an interview. If I get a better job, I might lose all the benefits, making me more broke than now. How do we even escape this and actually be even slightly financially okay
“Only by empowering individuals to create long-term change in their lives and their communities can we begin to break the cycle of poverty.” Empowering individuals starts with education. Period. Edit: Most people assumed I meant college and university; I am referring to primary education, especially quality elementary, middle school, kindergarten, and Pre-K education. Improved Pre-k education especially would take the burden off of working families and increase access to books for children. We have a lot of ground to cover in improving our educational system, and it may even need a drastic remodel.
I’m all for these programs and agree with the article. It’s actually expensive to be poor. My only concern with universal income is that it could easily be defeated by everyone raising prices. I.e. if you currently rent an apartment for $700/month and a $500 universal income comes into effect tomorrow, what’s to stop landlords from increasing the rent to $1300/month? But again, I’m no economist and have no idea how this would work. I’m not against trying it since whatever we have now is not working anyways.
I work in middle east, my mom died back at my home, and i couldnt book my tickets and show my last respect to her, because of this money problem, and first time in life i felt so poor and vulnerable, and i am in still my 20s and my mother is not a old lady,,,, Life is mess my friends, poor gets nothing out of it
Wages must rise! In 2022, had the minimum wage kept up with inflation since 1979, the minimum wage today would be $34 an hour. The skyrocketing cost of healthcare, which bankrupt many people even though they have health insurance, secondary education, and housing, especially on the west and east coast of the United States, and the fact that wages have been stagnant and that the rich have been funneling wealth to themselves at the expense of everybody else and now CEOs earn 300 times what their average employees are in when it used to be only 20 times in the late 70s, means that the rich are getting richer and everybody else is falling into poverty. We must push back against the lies by the rich of trickle down economics and push back against their propaganda networks on Fox. I don’t think that a universal basic income should be given to people who are earning over $100,000 a year because they don’t need it. If they fall below $50,000 a year in income, then they can apply to get a universal basic income until they are able to earn a living wage again.
An exceptional book that turns the question about escaping poverty on its head is “The Prosperity Paradox” by Clayton Christensen, Efosa Ojomo, and Karen Dillon. Instead of asking the question, how do we get rid of poverty, a simple reframing of the question to “How do we increase prosperity” can have a significant effect.
My concern with a UBI is that we would have to make sure people didn’t just raise rent and prices to match. For instance, my mother is on disability, social security, and lives in government housing. Every time she gets an increase in those benefits, her rent goes up to match. Add to that, since she has “more income”, the amount of food stamps she receives goes down. It’s a losing game.
I’m a huge fan of the idea of UBI. Even more as automation obsoletes more and more jobs. Right now there is 3.5 MILLION truck drivers in the USA. It’s very obvious they are about to be phased out with self driving trucks over the next 30 years. Is the learn to code thing accurate for them? I can go down the list but it’s likely over the next 50 years we will see most jobs be on the verge if not 100% replaced by some automation. Sure there will always be some truckers, lawyers, accountants, retail people, etc. Just like how there still is people on horse back in extremely remote parts of first world countries like the USA. But you’re talking about maybe enough to count on your hands if not slightly more. Like it is something when you might go from 3.5 million truck drivers to maybe 20 or 30 that drive in extreme remote areas AI isn’t good at driving YET. And unlike other types of obsolete, we are obsoleting the human. But we are are a live. So what happens to us? How would companies even sell to us if no one really has work to get income? These things have to be figured out.
Lack of Access To The Internet, Seeing Our Parents Struggle with Poverty and seeing them go through it makes us feel bad for them, we are always worried about them, sometimes putting there needs before our own. The Education System itself failing the students. The teachers are teaching, with the students not fully understanding the lessons. Even after doing homework they are still confused.
In a article about poverty, not a word was talked about why incomes from jobs can be so low in the first place that even welfare benefits leave people slightly better off. The problem of low wages resulting from private employment was discussed as if it were a natural phenomenon. No questions were raised about why firms give such a disproportionately low remuneration to the workers who contribute such a lot towards the enormous profits that the bosses earn. As long as we allow these criminal profits to be accumulated by using the merciless logic of the ‘free’ market, poverty won’t go away. Scarcity isn’t a natural condition of the world anymore. We have a load of unearned wealth in the hands of a few individuals who have no use of it and in order to keep things that way, we let millions to starve.
Here’s an idea, correct me if i made a mistake. Employment dosent only give you money but also opens various other opportunities, for example, since you’re employed, you’re now eligible for a loan and now you can use the acquired loan to build a new skill or invest. I think the welfare funds offer you an opportunity to grow/make progress and not sustainabily feed you.
It is really impressive that you were able to deftly avoid saying the word “capitalism” once during this article, and frame the entire issue as related to government benefits. “Hmmm, people who work don’t earn enough money to survive and do better on the measly welfare offered by the State? Can’t be the fault of their kind hearted employers, must be a problem with welfare.”
I’m not an economist but I can imagine this in my country which is considered a “developing” country. Despite the basic minimum wage increases over the years, there are still many poor people. It’s going to remain the same if along with the increase in salary, prices of basic necessities and commodities also continuously increase. The most effective way, I think, is by upgrading education and destroying corruption and cartels. People can then have better access to their needs if the prices can be lowered and people can grow their own sources of income.
I taught in the public schools for 23 years and watched kids volunteer for poverty. Otherwise bright and capable kids threw away the greatest gift society could give them, a free education. Many came to my class two or more years behind their classmates in reading. I was able to help the ones who wanted it. Others fell further behind. By contrast I had Burmese kids who spent the previous year or two in a refugee camp in Thailand. They knew real poverty. They spoke almost no English on the first day of school. They came to help sessions at lunch. They came after school. They worked incredibly hard. Their parents worked the kind of jobs few Americans want to do anymore. Sometimes both parents worked two jobs. Of the 20 or so Burmese kids who came through my school, every single one of them graduated.
ok this one is really hitting home rigth now, i’m 26 single, i had to left medicine university 1 year before graduation because the venezuelan goverment wanted us in jail for helping the wounded in 2019, now i have no ways to continue university, i work to survive in brazil . . . but i actually win less than 300$ a month and i dont really have a goverment help . . . . yeah . . . its pretty hard to get out of this.
I was in deep poverty for two years between 2011-2013 in NYC. If it wasn’t for government subsidies like unemployment, food stamps, welfare, medicaid, and others, I wouldn’t be in the position I am now making six figures. I’m convinced I would’ve been stuck as “working poor,” if I didn’t have the time and training to pursue higher paying careers during that time period.
As a disabled worker on benefits (before covid took my job) I can attest how accurate this article is. With my warnings between $10-$13/hr I realized I could’ve made more from benefits had I just accepted my disability and stayed out of the work force- I likely earned only a mere $100 more a month than if I’d not worked- but I stuck to it for the measly lure of refund checks during tax time and whatever pitiful bonuses (i.e. vacation pay, Christmas bonus, etc) I could get from my employer. At the end of the day working hardly kept me out of poverty but at least it gave me a chance to build some type of work history, get out of the grungy apartment I’m stuck in and make a little more dough- emphasis on LITTLE. Capitalism as it is sucks.
I used to work in HR at a hotel. During the slow season, many lower income employees would request to be laid off instead of having reduced hours. This guaranteed that they would be eligible for certain benefits from the state that they would be exempt from with any income, no matter how low. In the richest country in the world, with some of the smartest people in the world, it’s a real shame that we can’t find reasonable and sustainable ways to deal with poverty.
With universal basic income, corporate housing will simply raise the rent since now everyone have more money. You seen this in student loan: when the government started provide more accessible student loans, tuitions in higher education skyrocketed. Part time job during college used to pay the bill; now, you can barely afford textbooks.
It’s like someone took my last decade or so and put it in a short article. Hits home. And it’s not like I haven’t tried to better myself or improve my situation either. Earned two degrees which I haven’t been able to use yet and constantly strive for annual raises at work. Not minimum wage or doctor levels but it’s ok-ish ($21 an hour). Unfortunately life just seems to enjoy f**king with me and my family and setbacks, disappointments happen. It didn’t help when it was decided I earned barely over the pathetically-low, antiquated mark to get even a penny of food or medical insurance help. Somehow in this world a $2 raise can be a bad thing.
One more thing to point out.. poverty reduces IQ by 15 points according to a study. It observed the affects of poverty on a specific village that is completely reliant on crops. Due to their weather conditions, these farmers are rich fore 6 months and very poor in the other 6 months. And scientists observed them being less cognitively efficient in the later mother due to stress.
I left the military at 26 and started getting $1200 a month. It helped me go to school on the old GI Bill that wasn’t so good, and then I got my degree and started a professional job, but the pay wasn’t great. However, I still got the money to supplement the cheap employers, and then tried a few things before landing the right job and now make over $100k while receiving another $25k in VA pension income.
When you live in a poor neighborhood, you are living in an area where you have poor schools. When you have poor schools, you have poor teachers. When you have poor teachers, you get a poor education. When you get a poor education, you can only work in a poor-paying job. And that poor-paying job enables you to live again in a poor neighborhood. So, it’s a very vicious cycle – Malcolm X ✊
We Argentinians have found a solution to this dilemma: evasion. You take a job, get paid in cash or crypto, work like a regular worker, and keep receiving government aid. This way, you earn more from your job than a regular worker because you don’t pay salary taxes. You may miss out on severance pay, but the extra income compensates for it. The money you save is commonly invested for a better return than any pension. 😁
Add to the mix: all the media newspieces about some really poor boy somewhere who studied under a lamppost after, I don’t know, a tsunami took his house, and managed a great position in some company or public service… And then all the very comfortable high/middle class people perusal that on TV and deciding that every poor person no matter what should be exactly like him.
I have notices my family got better and better with each generation because though they were poor and came from the highlands they were able to make constant good decisions based on the reality of their situation. I am lucky to be born with parents that cared about giving me education and sith that I continued to make good decisions. Life is not easy but making good decisions do help. Most of the environment I know really didn’t. Had kids early without preparation and planning, didn’t pursue education and put party’s first. My family was very encouraging and helped me look at life with a fighting spirit.
I remember a friend in Germany, she was given a student loan by the government and had it bad enough to be qualified for the maximum amount. We both worked at the same tech company the maximum allowed hours (just 15h per week for me and 5 for her, the job paid really well and you earn more you’ll lose your student status and not be eligible for benefits. I could work/earn more because I’m from a different country with higher thresholds). At the end we were both given a really nice bonus for our work. About a months worth of rent. And my friend had to turn it down, because it was above her annual threshold. Luckily we were able to work around the system a bit. It was close to new years and so they switched her last day of work to the first of january. But if that hadn’t been the case she would just have lost the money. Also loosing student status is really bad. Because then you are no longer insured via your parents and no longer eligible for student tariffs with public transport, various entrance fees (museums, cinema, sports, …) or student homes. The maximum monthly income for students in Germany is 450€. The average rent 350€-530€ (where we studied). So unless you are eligible for student credit or have parents helping you out you are in trouble. In comparison my maximum monthly income for students was 1250€ (Austria). Average rent is about the same in my home country. And in my country you aren’t given a government credit, but a stipend, so no requirement to pay it back. Plus extra payment if your marks are great.
Two sides to this. One: people who believe that a person should receive more reward for more work. Second: everyone should receive a livable wage no matter the work for humanitarian reasons. Quite frankly it’s a tough decision. I understand both situations and wish both could somehow exist side by side. Yet, we live in an imperfect world. I think there will never be one answer as people are complex, non uniform beings. Some dont want to be on poverty aids while others love the idea of free money. It’s a situation that has no perfect answer. To tell the truth, I favor the system where you have a choice. People deserve choice. So if we can find a way to get people above poverty without eliminating their options that would be best.
Hard thresholds usually work poorly. What about designing welfare programs in a way that the help you receive is only reduced 0.5X for every +X you receive from work? So you only get fully out of welfare once you make twice the base welfare income. It’s a linear function that adapts to the persons situation. This would keep people motivated to work, while still not let them starve to death.
a good rule to live by i it’s not how much you make it’s how much you save. People smoke a pack of cigarettes a day, buy pot weekly, starbucks daily, most expensive items at food stores, car they can’t afford, houses they can’t afford, not taking advantage of refinance opportunities when market drops in those areas if you do have loans. As much as it is a bad market, it’s also largely the persons fault. Case in point how almost every single lottery winner to date ends up bankrupt. mismanagement of money is a very real thing.
There’s one downside to universal basic income. It is not tide to prices. Setting a universal basic income is just setting the new “low”. As long as sellers continue to price their goods based on who can afford and also the cost of production ( which includes the cost of labor itself), there would always be those who would fall below the new poverty line.
In Canada, the sad thing is a CA100k salary lands you CA75k take home each year. That’s only US54.7K. It means after 20 yrs, you just made yourself US1M not including any expenses. For context, the home price in major cities now is about US1M now. Assuming you are able to save 20% of your income, which is unrealistic for many, you’d be really off to a bad start without having some external help from a loved one.
It’s not hard to escape poverty, but one generation has to make sacrifices, so the another generation can lift off the burden of poorness, my grandfather is the hero of my family, he worked so hard and takes risk in his life he barely took vacations the man never fulfill his personal hobbies and dreams, he likes traveling so much but always skip because he wanted to work more, by the time of his death we were prosperous, still are, it is the blessings of my grandpa, he inspired me to work so hard so i can buy my favorite house and favorite car, or anything, focus and belief is important in life
I think Universal Basic Income is closer than ever cuz in the next 5yrs automation and AI will skyrocket and many ppl will lose their jobs… Taxi driver job lost to self driving car Waiter job lost to robots Factory jobs again lost to robots Etc. So we will soon be experiencing drastic changes in the upcoming years
if you wanna escape poverty youre gonna have to start your own business (sounds easy right?) but then you’d have to consider the question, “can I still get back up if my business idea fails”? this is the main roadblock of poverty, NOT EVERYONE CAN AFFORD TO FAIL. if you have the guts to do it then by all means, go ahead. and i wish you luck.
This is a complex issue. Some states do bare minimum, especially the southern states. I am originally from Ohio and grew up on the system until age 11, however during that time my mother was able to escape poverty and find a middle income job with minimal education. I will give you an example of how bad it is, In Ohio the maximum unemployment you can get as a single person is 475 week and in Alabama is 275 week. Like what the heck is 275 gonna do? I could give plenty of other examples, but I digress. We need to have uniform programs across the nation and political stances should not be a factor in providing care in order for ppl to progress. The nation does bare minimum and act like they are doing great things. Like why are we the richest nation and yet do not have universal healthcare?
It is simple in my eyes; to resolve the cycle. Once a job is acquired. There should be a time-delay on the discontinuation of any said benefit. Food: a wait period of 4 months before a decrease or cancellation of food benefits occurs. And if that said person IS up for cancellation. It will be a percentage based cancellation, in this case: 100% to 75% to 55% to 40% over the 4 month period. The 40% would persist until that said person can prove that their income can sustain nearly the same level of foodstuffs as they did WITH the full benefit. Then then benefit falls to 10% or $100 (whichever is greater) at the end of that calendar year and expires entirely 6 months later.
The solution my government has come up with (and mind that I’m by no means arguing it’s a perfect one) is compensating people over time not worked or income not received. Even if you’re earning minimum wage, this should be enough to offset the benefits of not working at all. Because the amount of welfare income you’re missing out on will always be less than or equal to what you’re earning working. Also paying people less than minimum wage isn’t something you can get away with here like you can in the US, so that’s not a problem either. This of course does not take into account e.g. extra costs associated with working, but it does avoid a large part of the problem in an elegant way. For instance, imagine I’m getting a welfare income of minimum wage, calculated over a standard 40h work week. Then I get a job that I can work 20h a week that pays slightly above minimum wage. I’ll still get my welfare income, but it’s calculated over the remaining 20h, so I’m earning more than I was before. Similarly, you could compensate people over income not received. In that case, the government would supplement your income up to minimum wage. Your paycheque is subtracted from your welfare income so the amount of money you get is the same until you start earning more than minimum wage. It’s perhaps not trivial to implement a perfect solution, but it’s not all that hard for the US to improve even just a little. Large parts of the population are just a single unexpected medical bill away from poverty, thanks to its also abysmal healthcare system.
Your article is only about the USA, and other similar countries. I’m from Kazakhstan 🇰🇿 and in this country there is no benefit paid to the unemployed. If you don’t work, you will basically starve to death. I obtained my BS from the USA, and I noticed that a lot of things that are generally discussed in the USA do not suit other countries in the world. So, I think it is crucial to point which country you are talking about in such articles. You don’t know who is perusal your article. Ted articles are pretty popular and has a good reputation. However, only now, when I have lived for 7 years in Kazakhstan after leaving the USA, and I had lived in the USA for 6 years to learn English and to obtain my I undergraduate degree, I realised that a lot of things discussed in Ted, in other reputable sources such as the Economist, etc. can be applied to the USA only. Other countries, such as post-soviet countries need different discussions. Therefore, it could have been respectful of you, if you had mentioned which part of the world you are talking about when you are discussing about poverty, or the benefits received from government. P.S. I’m not upset or dissatisfied with my own life here. I love my country. People here are hardworking, hospitable, and genuinely helpful to each other.
“imagine that you are unemployed and been searching job for months” BOI i don’t have to Imagine. I’m 29. Graduated last year. Unemployed. Living with my parents. I throw my CV everywhere at this point…I don’t even have access to government help cause I am not “poor enough”. I have no hope anymore. Im just tired.
I remember I decided I was gonna be self-sufficient. I walked away from a stable life on section -8 and food stamps but I worked. I’ve basically been homeless ever since. That was 20 years ago. I’m still homeless. Becoming self-sufficient is harder than you know. Especially if you were never given the tools and values to fight for a better life. It’s nobody’s fault, but a little encouragement helps. I even came up with a solution to my poverty but don’t have the wherewithal to apply it to my life. Finally, I’ve reached early retirement age. I have a financial foundation but will still live beneath the poverty line. However, I have also learned that the Good Life is an attitude. Nevertheless, everyone who works should be able to make ends meet with something leftover to enjoy life!
I have developed that there is an idea that there is the Poverty Paradox that as you make more money you tend to spend more to be able to keep up with it. Not to mention that inflation seems to bring fourth higher prices but not higher wages. The system seems to favor all but the poor due to us living off the government and not contributing much to taxes. We are left to be dependent on the government until we are able to break the loop through the act of someone else.
those are all okay-good solutions but none of them actually tackle the root of the problem, a solution that would actually do that is: workers get paid the full or atleast very near the full amount of the value they created with the labour they put in (rather than what happens now in most places which is that workers get a small portion of the value).
the problem is employers refusing to pay their workers a proper wage because capitalism incentivizes it. the same capitalism that dictates that we live in a world where profits take precedent over human lives the quote used at the beginning of the article was said by nelson mandela, he was a socialist and he knew this
I have real quick question about Universal income. I know you stated in your article that it could in theory prevent people from falling into the welfare trap. The problem I see is how giving everyone of all ages a government check would stop people from falling into the welfare trap. I can see how it could keep people from going into extreme poverty, but universal income has the same problem as other government welfare programs. Which is that it does not find a way to motivate people to work. I would appreciate it if you could explain in more detail how such a system would work. As it still seems unclear to me, thank you.
Your childhood to teenage experience will have a huge contribution in your future, if you live in a poor and abusive environment you will become traumatized when you reach adulthood making you unable to succeed in life and high chance that you will fall into a depression that leads to poor health, poor health leads to poverty.
I was on welfare for a while and once I got a job my life became considerably more difficult, as I had then lost a lot of the benefits that came with being on welfare (less fees etc.). I knew a few people that simply refused to actually look for work because they didn’t feel it was worth it, or simply believed that is wasn’t worth their time, or too much of a risk regarding their financial stability.
UBI sounds good. My question is what prevents the market prices from rising to the point where the value of that income to be virtually zero? As in if rent costs $750 and you get a UBI of $10,000, and in response the prices raise to $7500 along with the other extraneous costs of living going another zero in the decimal point. Will it account for growing population too, which would factor into inflation? Will it also be taxed?
I’ve always been told by people that adding universal income or increasing minimum wage would only succeed in lowering the value of the currency and that it wouldn’t actually do any good. Is that something you can just outrun by continually increasing the income/wage? Can you address this in a future article? It’d be cool to hear about countries that pulled off things like that successfully.
An entirely alternate solution is to have a minimum wage sufficiently higher than the income that qualifies you for assistance. Most modern economies are largely market driven in nature with a handful of people pocketing a large fraction of the wealth. Making business owners pay their workers justly is the first step to removing poverty. Charity and unemployment “benefits” will never be the cure to the problem. The cure will have to come from an equitable distribution of the spoils of production.
This is Literally my life lol I’m on my way to a job interview right now and I’m on welfare and it’s exactly like that here in Australia if we earn a too much we get cut off the benifits but then if we end up nearly dead broke they’ll help us but soon they’re implementing “work for the doll” (doll=dollar🤣) where you have to be working (at a salvos or thrift shop) to earn your benifits lol
Regarding the sentence “mainstream economic models assume people are rational actors…” I suggest people read “Misbehaving” by Richard H. Thaler who has made major progress in introducing psychology into economy and has indeed revolutionalised the field and even helped governments improve their mechanisms. The book gives a truly fantastic insight into how and why people make certain financial mistakes and choices, and makes us more aware and immune to those same mistakes.
this life doesn’t feel real anymore, the disassociation that comes after owning money to so many debt collectors for so long is that makes you think so negative. i had work and work to pay up and i’m still in the same place as two years ago. i never thought i’ll believe that sometimes being unalived is the only way that you’ll feel relief. losing everything is not joke, getting my car taken away and a percentage of my wages as well is crazy. i’m still hoping to be debt free by 2030 or with the lotto.
Also worth considering is the fact that under UBI, the companies and capitalists that control food and land and health care and whatnot can now arbitrarily increase the prices. You would need something like rent control impelemented in different ways to combat this and make a UBI effective. Alternatively, Universal Basic Needs or something of the like circumvents this problem.
When you get paid SO LITTLE for the time you spend working that you can’t cover the cost of a place to live, food, and power, that is the real problem. If the government help programs gave you just enough to subsist on, but all forms of employment gave you MORE than basic subsistence, there wouldn’t be a problem because getting a job would always be worth it. But dispassionate rampant capitalism has made our system where no employer wants to pay more than the absolute bare minimum for most jobs, and even then they try to SQUEEZE those workers to do far more than they should have to while they are on the clock. And while the corporate higher ups can’t legally tell them to cut corners, it’s basically an open secret in nearly all organizations among their management that you have to cut corners in order to maintain the corporate expectations for output. People are overworked and underpaid, and corporations will never fix this on their own because from their perspective there is an unlimited number of unemployed drones looking for work, they have to be forced to take care of their employees by law and only the government can fix that problem. Make working actually worth it, then all these issues will go away.
UBI is honestly the way to a better society in my eyes. As a vet I earned the disability benefits & housing/schooling benefits I have and to be honest it’s the only thing keeping me afloat while I carve new ways to earn income outside the military! I can’t see y every one should have that same safety net! I think it’s a human right to have the ability to participate in society. Majority want to but pay is too low in many jobs to survive and provide, and a lot turn to the only thing they have left, crime! Human beings will do what they have to to survive and we punish that rather than change laws to make sure everyone has a fair shake. I see nothing wrong with less crime, less homelessness, cleaner streets, healthier and more educated ppl. Less time wasted on survival and more time spent making connections, communities, families, self improvement.
Living in a country where there is nothing like welfare, it always fascinates me to see people complain about welfare being stopped when they start working. Our government never gives you free money, not even during lockdown (we ignored the lockdowns and kept working because corona might eventually kill you, but hunger will CERTAINLY kill you.) Being on welfare gives you time, if you use that resource well, you can turn your life around. When there is no welfare, you either succeed or you die, there is no safety net, maybe knowing that there is no plan B is the ultimate motivation. I went through 3 burnouts in the last 5 years working and studying up to 20 hours/day to have a better situation. If I had the welfare option, things would have been a lot easier.
Having assistance slowly phase out as income increases makes the most sense to me. It is honestly insane that you can be in poverty 1 second getting assistance barely getting by and then get a mere $0.20 raise and all of a sudden you make too much and all that assistance is gone leaving you in a worst spot.
As a teacher is see the poverty cycle everyday in class. Most students that come from poor families have a very poor self discipline and have difficult time taking on responsibility. While each student is given an opportunity to get a very good education, most do not take advantage of that opportunity and fail or do very poorly in school. Once out of high school saddled with a very poor education and very few practical skills to market, young people acquire employment paying low wages that has little upward mobility, and therefore the cycle continues.
I feel devastated that I’m going to lose everything. I’m not eating well so I’m not well in many aspects. The stress is making me have stomach issues. Not sure what to do. I have a child and regret bringing her into poverty. Ts so frustrating and sad. Mostly lonely. 💔💔💔 Like feelings of chronic loneliness. So much disappointment. Totally humiliated and embarrassed of my existence.
When you make too much to be given housing and you make too little to rent housing. I’ve seen and experienced this. When I recognized what was happening, I saw the trap and immediately went looking for a better job, because I knew the moment I found myself on the wrong side of that line, it was over and I’d never get out. Sadly most people either see it too late or resign to fate.
🎯 Key Takeaways for quick navigation: 00:38 🪢 Poverty traps are economic and environmental circumstances that perpetuate poverty for generations. 01:08 🏢 Welfare traps are situations where government benefit programs create disincentives for people to work due to loss of benefits as they earn more. 02:38 🔄 Universal basic income is a proposed solution to eliminate welfare traps and provide a fixed benefit to all members of society regardless of income or employment status. 03:10 🌍 Universal basic income might prevent people from falling into poverty in the first place by creating a stable income floor for everyone. 04:07 🤝 Resolving the welfare trap requires empowering individuals to create long-term change in their lives and communities. Made with HARPA AI
I never want to look down on anyone’s situation but I do believe poverty can be a mindset as much as circumstances…there are some people who genuinely try everything to get ahead but there are others who don’t. Secondly if you have one child and you are struggling…why would you continue to have children that you can’t afford…
In Poland we have a very complicated situation : we have the bonuses for people with many children but because of that in most of cases those parents’ families don’t work at all because simply there is no need to do so because the welfare program is so beneficial that it’s enough for the whole family to sustain their lives but because of that it promotes laziness and unemployment This law was put into action by our previous government because they wanted to fight Poland’s demography problem where more deaths happen than children are being born. This whole thing could be easily fixed by allowing to receive bonus only if at least 1 parent is working which would resolve both demographic and laziness problems but I quess our government haven’t though about it or they didn’t want to :/
Poverty is a social class and that is so unfortunate, it’s true some work really hard to get to the top while others just get corrupt and cheat their way there, the unfortunate part comes when the people on top fail to recognize how some of their piers got there but judge and criticize those who have very little or nothing, I guess it is how they say money attracts money, and that’s the sad part that a piece of green paper can take the humanity out of some folks.
What a depiction of the supermarket. I know it became a widespread idea, but I truly believe it is mostly wrong to say healthy food is too expensive while junk food is cheap. I looked at my Walmart’s price for an 8oz bag of chips. $2.76, meanwhile 16oz of apples is $1.39. Ultra processed food is not cheap. It might be cheap for how many calories it contains, but lack of calories is not a problem in my part of the world. Statistically, about 5-7% of Americans hit their recommended daily fiber intake. Which means we are routinely AVOIDING simple and cheap whole fruits and vegetables.
It’s so interesting how the Islamic financial system solves this paradox. I wonder if someone would research how they relate and what’s the outcomes of such implementation. For example, there are classifications of what we call now poor. The classifications is on the means of having the basic life needs shelter, food, clothing, healthcare, education, etc.. The lowest level would be someone who do not have these needs at all. The next level is someone will have them today, but do not know if they can have them tomorrow or next week. And so on. The support comes from those who are above the poor levels only.
If we did do a universal basic income, wouldn’t the shops and businesses (eventually) just make stuff more expensive (competition/ inflation) until the amount is “obsolete”, meaning we have to either abandon the scheme or increase the amount each individual receives…….and won’t raising the amount weaken the pound/dollar/euro etc??? Which ain’t a good thing??……..I’m not a financial expert just curious if anyone can weigh in, happy to be proven wrong but please show your work. Thanks 👍