"poverty mentality"

PipneyJane

ninnoodle wrote: »

I think a lot of people think this is what being OS is all about. Being stingy and miserable, and down on yourself, denial. For me it's not about that at all, and more about being clever with your money and how you spend it, about being clever with costs that eat up our money in small ways, finding ways to seek pleasure without feeling you have to spend money all the time, how once you start cooking from scratch you see 'the light' - how pleasurable it is and how much healthier it is to ready-made and for your purse.

Absolutely correct. OS is not denial for denial's sake. It's about choosing where you're going to spend your money while maintaining a good quality of life and working towards your goals. BTW, your goal doesn't have to be my goal, so long as it works for you. If you want to save up and buy Mozart's harpsichord, that's fine by me.

scrabbles_2

Molly41 wrote: »

I wonder how our children perceive our Old Style ways though? I did have the bare essentials in that I had a roof over my head and clothes on my back. However it singled me out as being different - which is a difficult concept for children to cope with.

I still struggle to this day with the way I was brought up - my parents had and have a poverty mentality and it impacted greatly upon me.

Molly, I'm sorry you had an unhappy childhood. I don't believe parents have any obligation to spend money making sure their children 'fit in'. They do have an obligation to try and make sure their children do not endure constant misery. Not necessarily through consumerism.

I did not have any new clothes growing up - not even underwear. Everything was passed down from older siblings, extended family, or from charity shops. I had a good many fewer toys than most of my friends and most of these were not new either. What I did have was the total, unswerving knowledge that my parents loved me, completely and utterly. So I was never unhappy or insecure through lack of 'stuff'. I did encounter bullying at times but I don't know any child that has not - you are always 'different' to the crowd in one way or another.

I have that to this day and I have never questioned whether my parents could have spent more on us kids rather than on investing in their future (on reflection they almost certainly could have) and I have never questioned what they do with their money now. It's their money, to spend - or not.

I'm sorry that you were unhappy as a child. Hopefully now you are an adult who can make her own happiness. You seem to have unresolved issues regarding your upbringing. Money seems to be the peg you hang these on. I hope you find a way to resolve those soon.

[Deleted User]

In this economic climate people who are careful about what they spend and who live a less consumer lifestyle should be held up as an example to the rest. I think perhaps that povertty mentality is only experienced by those who do not do this if they are feeling superior at that moment. At least we can hold our heads high and be who we are with a degree of pride!

PipneyJane

RAS wrote: »

Don't think of a pink elephant.

Basic Neuro Linguistic Programming.

The human brain can only compute the negative by holding the obverse in mind.

Which is why "Don't fall" is pretty crummy advice from mums but so many use it.

There are too many things in here but a couple of obs.

1. People are OS for many reasons and financial poverty is only one of these.

2. Sometimes people experience poverty of imagination as well. That seriously limits their ability to seek and recognise opportunities.

Well put. That is the true poverty mindset. How many kids growing up on a sink estate look at the opportunities beyond it? How many of them have parents who encourage them to study and get an education so that they can leave the sink estate behind? (Or do their parents just view school as a way of warehousing them to get them out of the house?)

If there is a message to be learned from self-help books it is that we limit ourselves and prevent ourselves from achieving our goals. NLP is a great tool, which we can use to change the way we view the world, but it can't do miracles. We have to make a conscious effort to challenge old mindsets and think positively, i.e. when we shop at a charity shop, do we find ourselves worrying about "what will the neighbours say if they spot me?" or "what will my friends say?", instead of thinking "Great bargain. Now I've got an extra £100 I can trim off the clothing budget that I can put towards my holiday". It's all how you frame it.

lostinrates

I love pipney janes posts.

Any way,

The other thing that i think is important to bring into the discussion of poverty mentality and loops is purchasing choice. I prefer to buy local....of things made locally, or as near as possible. There is food miles and all that jazz, but there is also empoyment to consider. If i can save two p in the pound buying something from china rather than something from, say, birmingham, then perhaps i will find my tax eventually goes up by 3p to pay for the poor soul in birmingham who has no customer base anymore.

There is a limit to my magnanamousity, but this poverty loop is another real one.


Atm we live in a wreck. I know a lot of people are surprised we didn't get a bigger mortgage and do things quicker here, or rush on and do things cheaply. That for me is not os. We bought a house we can live in potentially forever. We are employing skilled people from the area, and doing things as we can afford with no incurred debt. Its slow, but its satisfactory and keeps employment in old fashioned skills. Instead of furnishing cheaply and now, we buy things we will probably never replace. They will cost more, so we do without longer, but they will probably never be replaced, and be beautiful. Whether new and wel made or second hand good stuff is worth waiting for. The only thing ofcourse, is that peoplle who can afford to buy new and don't both push rices up for people whoncannot afford it and again.....mean less work is available, pushing someone else down in the poverty cycle.


Before i joined mse. And in particular the debate forum, i was much tighter. Some of the posts on the poverty cycle opened my eyes into how the choices we make impact not just on us but on our economy. Responsible spending is as an important part of that as responsible saving i now believe, better for society than th eindividual as the individual ends up with comparitively less, but in a happier, better employed and fed country as a result.

snowleopard61

Ben84 wrote: »

Suppose my shoes were wearing out 15 years ago, I had little money so only had one pair and they were worn until they broke, so forcing me to rush out and pay full price and often because of having little money I'd buy cheap stuff at full price. This is a doubly bad choice, it costs so much more in the long term as I'm not using any offers or sales and I'm buying shoes that have a poor life span.

I've actually heard this described as the 'cardboard boots' problem - the name is fairly self-explanatory. It was what I experienced in my first job, when a monthly season ticket would have saved me a fortune but cost more than my weekly wage. When you have very little money the temptation is always to go for the lowest outlay rather than the best value.

HelenYorkshire

This is an interesting piece - especially some of the comments. Beware the...um...robust language! It's a site for young men, shall we say

http://www.cracked.com/blog/the-5-stupidest-habits-you-develop-growing-up-poor/

A few comments in there have referenced the Captain Vimes theory of socioeconomic unfairness

The reason that the rich were so rich, Vimes reasoned, was because they managed to spend less money.

Take boots, for example. He earned thirty-eight dollars a month plus allowances. A really good pair of leather boots cost fifty dollars. But an affordable pair of boots, which were sort of OK for a season or two and then leaked like hell when the cardboard gave out, cost about ten dollars. Those were the kind of boots Vimes always bought, and wore until the soles were so thin that he could tell where he was in Ankh-Morpork on a foggy night by the feel of the cobbles.

But the thing was that good boots lasted for years and years. A man who could afford fifty dollars had a pair of boots that'd still be keeping his feet dry in ten years' time, while the poor man who could only afford cheap boots would have spent a hundred dollars on boots in the same time and would still have wet feet.

rinabean

snowleopard61 wrote: »

I've actually heard this described as the 'cardboard boots' problem - the name is fairly self-explanatory. It was what I experienced in my first job, when a monthly season ticket would have saved me a fortune but cost more than my weekly wage. When you have very little money the temptation is always to go for the lowest outlay rather than the best value.

The place I read it was Terry Pratchett, in Men At Arms

“The reason that the rich were so rich, Vimes reasoned, was because they managed to spend less money.

Take boots, for example. He earned thirty-eight dollars a month plus allowances. A really good pair of leather boots cost fifty dollars. But an affordable pair of boots, which were sort of OK for a season or two and then leaked like hell when the cardboard gave out, cost about ten dollars. Those were the kind of boots Vimes always bought, and wore until the soles were so thin that he could tell where he was in Ankh-Morpork on a foggy night by the feel of the cobbles.

But the thing was that good boots lasted for years and years. A man who could afford fifty dollars had a pair of boots that'd still be keeping his feet dry in ten years' time, while the poor man who could only afford cheap boots would have spent a hundred dollars on boots in the same time and would still have wet feet.

This was the Captain Samuel Vimes 'Boots' theory of socioeconomic unfairness.”

It's entirely true! And you always get stupid advice in magazine columns, rich people telling poor people to just invest in quality and efficiency, as if we're just too stupid. :wall:

Mistral001

snowleopard61 wrote: »

I've actually heard this described as the 'cardboard boots' problem - the name is fairly self-explanatory. It was what I experienced in my first job, when a monthly season ticket would have saved me a fortune but cost more than my weekly wage. When you have very little money the temptation is always to go for the lowest outlay rather than the best value.

I have experienced it as well. Actually it was shoes, not boots and they were plastic and not cardboard.

I usually buy Clarkes shoes from a discount store. Since Clarkes shoes are about £40 to £60, the average discount price I paid was maybe £25. Last year I just could not afford to buy these shoes, so I decided to go to a few budget shoe shops. I could afford £8 and that seemed to be a fairly standard price for an economy pair of shoes, but they were plastic. I bought them as they looked OK and I thought nobody would notice the difference.

Plastic shoes lasted only four months compared to the Clarkes which usually last about two years. Hence cost per year for plastic shoes is 3x8 = £24 and cost per year for expensive leather ones is 0.5x25 = £12.50. The plastic shoes work out almost twice as expensive.

OK the clever and rattional people will say that saving up and buying the leather shoes is the obvious choice, but what if it is not a choice and you do not have the extra money for the leather shoes>

snowleopard61

rinabean wrote: »

The place I read it was Terry Pratchett, in Men At Arms

That explains it - I've never read it myself but the person who used the term would definitely have done.