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China is not third world
Brazil is not third world- although the crime rate is extremely high there.
Russia is not 3rd world
India it really depends on region, but it is not a solid third world country and borderline 2nd world in many ways.
I agree with you in many ways an average third worlder would be less miserable than a poor american even if they made more money. But in terms of actual amenities a poor or lower middle class family would most likely have more amenities available. Now a homeless person in U.S is a lot lower than the average third world family.
If India isn't third world, then no country on Earth is...its a massive nation with a large upper and middle class because of the overall population...India's poor are as poor as anywhere on Earth...I would still classify Brazil as third world albeit upper echelon third world...there are different levels of developing countries
I think a third world country is defined by a lack of one or more of the following...clean water, plumbing, ample food supply, access to education, thriving businesses, police protection, doctors and hospital systems.
The poorest of the poor in America has all these things, plus cable TV, a free Obama cell phone, food stamps, free education, and aid of various kinds.
Wrong.
We were poorest of the poor, making half the poverty level in our state. Here's what we got for being so poor:
Cable TV = NO
Obama phone = NO
Food Stamps = 1/3 of the amount the state was supposed to give us. We qualified for $300, we got $130. Likewise, grandma qualified for $230 she got $180. Their response was "go get a job", yet the ones with five kids get 100% of the benefits? Pfft.
Free Education = NO
Aid = Barely any, "get a job" was the go-to response, that and "you should've saved more " (to my grandmother who, when moved to the USA in '84 was already in poverty because Romania didn't allow her to keep anything. She was in her late 50s and didn't know English)
Every time I go for assistance and I hear "get a job" or see my grandmother getting screwed over for her benefits, it pisses me off. My grandmother should get more than the measly $400/month pension and $170 in food stamps. she can't live on her own, she's forced to live with my mom until she dies. She's completely dependent on my mother because she doesn't have aid like Medicare/Medicaid. Even when she lived by herself for awhile, she got zero help. Section 8 is a two to three years waiting list, utility assistance is limited and first come first served, my mother had to pay grandma's bills until she couldn't afford it anymore. Despite her age, grandma is an independent woman, seeing the light gone from her eyes because she can't be free to do whatever she wants and is forced to be dependent on my mother who works 70 hour weeks, kills me.
Frankly, people get assistance because they genuinely need it. I'd love to get a stable job, without dealing with illegal, unethical behavior from bosses. I'm sick of bad jobs where my money is stolen, I am sexually harassed, treated with kids gloves because I am disabled, where bosses go on power trips and act like psychopaths when you ask them politely to treat you more humanely. Since I cannot get a good stable job, I go for welfare.
Arizona isn't the only corrupt state that screws you over on benefits, north Carolina and Delaware has that problem too. My best friend in a 'worse off position' than I, couldn't get anything but $60 in food stamps despite making $800 a month. He was forced to live on friend's and family's goodwill, he felt like a burden begging for food and other things, he thought of suicide and was hospitalized often because he didn't have access to medical care, he finally, thanks to a good friend's goodwill, moved to Missouri and now has more help and is much better off even if he's working at Wal-Mart over there .
I won't get into Delaware, that state is beyond hope when it comes to welfare for the poor. let's just say a friend had to live several years with rotting teeth and being skin and bones because he got ZERO assistance for food and medical, not even his bf who had more disabilities could get anything. they moved to Pennsylvania, and the situation is better now.
I'm moving to Texas myself. I can't stand government programs meant for the poor and to help, being run by corrupt people.
Bad comparison
The way to compare is how many hours a person has to work to afford paying for their basic needs
People in the U.S. Make s lot of money but college and health care are not free
Actually, for poor people medical is free, and that has always been the case in the US.
As for college, many grants are available for the poor, as well as scholarships. If there is any cost that is not met by this, financial aid is available.
We were poorest of the poor, making half the poverty level in our state. Here's what we got for being so poor:
Cable TV = NO
Obama phone = NO
Food Stamps = 1/3 of the amount the state was supposed to give us. We qualified for $300, we got $130. Likewise, grandma qualified for $230 she got $180. Their response was "go get a job", yet the ones with five kids get 100% of the benefits? Pfft.
Free Education = NO
Aid = Barely any, "get a job" was the go-to response, that and "you should've saved more " (to my grandmother who, when moved to the USA in '84 was already in poverty because Romania didn't allow her to keep anything. She was in her late 50s and didn't know English)
Every time I go for assistance and I hear "get a job" or see my grandmother getting screwed over for her benefits, it pisses me off. My grandmother should get more than the measly $400/month pension and $170 in food stamps. she can't live on her own, she's forced to live with my mom until she dies. She's completely dependent on my mother because she doesn't have aid like Medicare/Medicaid. Even when she lived by herself for awhile, she got zero help. Section 8 is a two to three years waiting list, utility assistance is limited and first come first served, my mother had to pay grandma's bills until she couldn't afford it anymore. Despite her age, grandma is an independent woman, seeing the light gone from her eyes because she can't be free to do whatever she wants and is forced to be dependent on my mother who works 70 hour weeks, kills me.
Frankly, people get assistance because they genuinely need it. I'd love to get a stable job, without dealing with illegal, unethical behavior from bosses. I'm sick of bad jobs where my money is stolen, I am sexually harassed, treated with kids gloves because I am disabled, where bosses go on power trips and act like psychopaths when you ask them politely to treat you more humanely. Since I cannot get a good stable job, I go for welfare.
Arizona isn't the only corrupt state that screws you over on benefits, north Carolina and Delaware has that problem too. My best friend in a 'worse off position' than I, couldn't get anything but $60 in food stamps despite making $800 a month. He was forced to live on friend's and family's goodwill, he felt like a burden begging for food and other things, he thought of suicide and was hospitalized often because he didn't have access to medical care, he finally, thanks to a good friend's goodwill, moved to Missouri and now has more help and is much better off even if he's working at Wal-Mart over there .
I won't get into Delaware, that state is beyond hope when it comes to welfare for the poor. let's just say a friend had to live several years with rotting teeth and being skin and bones because he got ZERO assistance for food and medical, not even his bf who had more disabilities could get anything. they moved to Pennsylvania, and the situation is better now.
I'm moving to Texas myself. I can't stand government programs meant for the poor and to help, being run by corrupt people.
You sound as though you think someone owes you something. We owe you nothing. You don't have to stay in the US. Other people work to pay for every single bit of aid that the govt gives out. If they say you need to get a job, then you need to get a job. The US is very generous with the aid it pays out. We expect people that can work, to work. Maybe Romania, or wherever you said your family came from, would be a better fit for you.
Nothing like people being given stuff for free, and them complaining because they think, for whatever reason, they deserve more. We owe you absolutely nothing! Get off your butt and get a job like everyone else! Or return to the country of your origin. The latter would be my suggestion.
You sound as though you think someone owes you something. We owe you nothing.
Of course not.
It were all those "sweet promises" about the wonders of the capitalist world, when the US wanted Soviet system to be dismantled ( remember - these people were from Socialist Romania?) But after it has been dismantled ( not without the slimy "help" from the US) - the tone of the voice drastically changed; "go work."
"We need more suckers to work for pennies, to make money off your back. How do you think we became so successful at the first place?"
You sound as though you think someone owes you something. We owe you nothing. You don't have to stay in the US. Other people work to pay for every single bit of aid that the govt gives out. If they say you need to get a job, then you need to get a job. The US is very generous with the aid it pays out. We expect people that can work, to work. Maybe Romania, or wherever you said your family came from, would be a better fit for you.
Nothing like people being given stuff for free, and them complaining because they think, for whatever reason, they deserve more. We owe you absolutely nothing! Get off your butt and get a job like everyone else! Or return to the country of your origin. The latter would be my suggestion.
This attitude is typical of some Eastern Europeans and some refugees- they believe the US government OWES them money and support. They argue with you about it. There are many who have never worked a day in this country, claim disability, and get monthly Social Security money. I don't know where this attitude comes from.
Meanwhile, hard working people will get less than they put in for SSA when they retire in a few decades, and most who work their whole lives will not qualify for benefits when they need it. It's a messed up world.
I think a third world country is defined by a lack of one or more of the following...clean water, plumbing, ample food supply, access to education, thriving businesses, police protection, doctors and hospital systems.
The poorest of the poor in America has all these things, plus cable TV, a free Obama cell phone, food stamps, free education, and aid of various kinds.
This is how the poorest people in America's richest cities live. I don't see any cell phone or Tvs.
The average third world "worker" is defined as someone who has a regular wage-paying job and lives with his family. They would now have a cellphone. They can afford a TV, but most probably don't have one, because TV really, really sucks in third world countries and cable is pretty expensive, and all cable programs are in foreign languages. Places without running water are now rare, as are places off the electrical power grid.
They live in a house with modern cooking faculties, usually a propane stove using bottled gas, which is sold by a guy cruising the streets in a truck. Refrigerators are not universal, and there is a member of the family who is a "housewife", who is free to go to a nearby marketplace daily for perishable food. There is plenty of efficient, reliable public transportation, but usually a simple market within walking distance. Locally produced foods and staples are affordable.
In most of the third world, the climate is not threatening. Heating the house is not necessary. Neither is cooling because they are acclimated to their weather, and have no problem enduring hot days. Houses might not have glazed windows, so breezes pass through for comfort. It can get cold at night, especially in mountain climates, where a household has an abundance of blankets and warm clothing. Living quarters are not spacious, and family members sleep together for warmth. Each family member owns only a few changes of clothing, which is laundered frequently, by hand, and air dried.
One person with a wage-paying job will support a large extended family. The rest of the family is knowledgeable about handicrafts, and can make a lot of what a European family would buy, and it is rarely necessarily to hire outside services. So a worker's wages basically pay for food, a few utilities (water, cooking gas, electric). There is a light bulb in each room, but few other electrical appliances. It might be a family-owned house, or rented from a landlord.
Nearly all third world countries now have access to medical care at almost no direct cost to the patient, and every town has some kind of a clinic. But doctors are thinly distributed and nurses have little medical knowledge and pharmacists are mostly just clerks and modern drugs are expensive, even OTCs, so most health care is still folk medicine. Death is taken as a fact of life, and old age comes early and illness is endured and one plays through pain.
The above are a few of the respects in which a third world worker has a life that is so different from first world, that it is impossible to make a comparison. Being a worker in the third world is totally unlike, in every respect, being poor in the first world. Neither better nor worse, except to the degree that one is stoic and adaptable to the circumstances.
So according to that graphic, The Bahamas is considered "third world", hence the green.
Hard to say how comparisons can be made. Cuba has a HIGHER HDI score than does Barbados. Assuming that you believe Cuban data (and I don't) can one seriously argue that Cubans are better off than are Barbadians, when one looks at their drastically lower living standards? Maybe they theoretically have more access to doctors (Cuba produces too many), but do they get worse health care (Cuba hospitals are a mess).
What I will say is that poor Americans probably have less access to decent housing and healthcare, and maybe even tertiary level education than do the poor in better off developing nations like Barbados. Tertiary level education in Barbados is highly subsidized, and in fact was free until the current economic difficulties forced the government to start charging tuition.
Really the USA has nothing to boast of when we see how its poor live.
Barbados is considered High Human Development. This places it on par with European nations like Romania and Bulgaria.
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