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Mississippi's poverty is due to an explosion of a certain portion of the population. That segment is marginally employable at best. But the government has hooked that group up to a 'resources' pipeline, which encourages them to continue exploding in number, regardless of now-irrelevant factors like availability of jobs. Mother Nature has her own ways of dealing with organisms which are not viable. Nanny Gubmint, however, is nothing like Mother Nature.
So, to adapt a line from Mae West... "Honey, wages had nothin' ta do with it."
I disagree with you. Mississippi has been a very poor state, even before welfare came into place. It has been quite poor for a long time, even before the 20th century. Mississippi had a very feudal economy. The plantation system was in use. In 1860 in Mississippi, slaves made up 55% of the state's population. You had a small portion of the population owning basically more than half of the population, and being in charge of the rest of the population. Natchez got rich off of slavery, but that wealth was held in the hands of a few. Slavery impeded the growth in industry, it exhausted the soil(cotton takes alot out of the soil) and it impeded technological innovation. You have stratified wealth, and a very large poor White population, as well as an enslaved Black population.
With the Civil War and the abolition of slavery, Mississippi's economy was devastated. Why? Because the economy was agrarian and ran on slavery. Most southern cities were small because they didn't have diversified economies.
Lack of investment in education meant a large segment of the population was illiterate, which added to the poverty.
Yes, the cost of living is much lower here. That really has little to do with the question of "are wages that low?". The answer to that question is that yes, wages in this state really are that low. However, the cost of living index for this state as an average means that you don't have to make anywhere near the same amount of money you did in Chicago to live the same lifestyle.
There's another caveat, though. While your comfortable lifestyle in Chicago included such things as reliable electrical supply, worthwhile education systems for your children, automobiles that you can depend on, and safe and sane housing, you can easily run into problems locating that in this state.
You'll end up paying roughly the same percentage of your income to survive in this state as you do in Chicago, but your quality of living is going to suffer a horrible, crippling, agonizing death.
Yes, the cost of living is much lower here. That really has little to do with the question of "are wages that low?". The answer to that question is that yes, wages in this state really are that low. However, the cost of living index for this state as an average means that you don't have to make anywhere near the same amount of money you did in Chicago to live the same lifestyle.
There's another caveat, though. While your comfortable lifestyle in Chicago included such things as reliable electrical supply, worthwhile education systems for your children, automobiles that you can depend on, and safe and sane housing, you can easily run into problems locating that in this state.
You'll end up paying roughly the same percentage of your income to survive in this state as you do in Chicago, but your quality of living is going to suffer a horrible, crippling, agonizing death.
Where do you live that you don't have any of this? On the coast, our electrical supply was very reliable, except during storms, but I've kept power until hit with cat 2 hurricane winds, up north power lines can & do snap from weight of snow & ice. Our cars are more reliable here because they aren't falling apart from the salt being put on the roads in the winter. Education, when I moved to MS there was things that students knew that I didn't even know & I'm like where yall learn this, in high school....I went to one of the best schools in MI and didn't even learn it. Safe & sane housing? WTH is sane housing? My housing is & has always been safe, I'm picky about what areas I live in so I won't move into an area infested with gangs or drugs & prostitues.
What I have found is, wages are lower but so is taxes & cost of living. I got by on the coast making about $10 an hr as a single parent (when first moving there)...of course it was better when I got a raise, and yes I had a little help from the state, but I definitely got by better in MS on that $10 an hr than I would've back home. I recently left the state but am making my way back lol...I never even changed my car registration because it's too expensive where I live. What I spend on food lasts longer in MS because I can get more for my money there. I have no state income taxes where I am, but they more than make up for that in other ways. With all that, and then more...MS has lower wages because the COL is way lower.
My orginal post asked about the standard of living for poor people who make under $10 an hour. My research still says that if you are part of the working poor you do better down south than pretty much anyplace in America because things are still relatively cheap. Of course you won't live the good life but you can afford a much nicer place to live in Mississippi on $8 an hour than $12 an hour in Los Angeles and low wage jobs like retail won't pay $12 an hour in most large high cost cities unless you are really lucky.
Yes, the cost of living is much lower here. That really has little to do with the question of "are wages that low?". The answer to that question is that yes, wages in this state really are that low. However, the cost of living index for this state as an average means that you don't have to make anywhere near the same amount of money you did in Chicago to live the same lifestyle.
There's another caveat, though. While your comfortable lifestyle in Chicago included such things as reliable electrical supply, worthwhile education systems for your children, automobiles that you can depend on, and safe and sane housing, you can easily run into problems locating that in this state.
You'll end up paying roughly the same percentage of your income to survive in this state as you do in Chicago, but your quality of living is going to suffer a horrible, crippling, agonizing death.
Oh, so true! There are reasons Mississippi wins titles like 'Worst place in America to be a woman' and 'Worst place in America to be a Child'. Move there, and those reasons will reveal themselves rather quickly.
It's a lovely place to live if you're smart, hard-working, have a good and reliably-marketable degree (or are going in farming with your daddy - or are going to work in his insurance agency or at his farm equipment dealership), have a good spouse to help with the bills, were born into a local network of friends and family, and live in a one of the many nice neighborhoods filled with nice houses (and can afford private schools for your kids).
Otherwise, you will be knocked flat by a wave of bleakness and hopelessness. Can you say "stranded"?
In the towns, there are nice areas where people are pretty close to perfect, and then there are the areas where bad boys roam about, breaking into cars, breaking into houses, assaulting the elderly... It's like the dichotomy in 'Demian', by Hermann Hesse: The World of Light, versus The World of Darkness. On one side are the winners, the non-smokers, the non-drinkers, those who go to the better churches, who spend their time fashioning lovely homes with lovely yards, who raise their children just-right and send them to private schools. On the other side are the Rickys and Tawnyas who watch a lot of cable TV, smoke like chimneys, go to the iffy churches, don't count "420" as 'doing drugs' ("Thayitt ain't druuuuuigs!!! everbawdi smawks uh liiiidle wuaeeeeid."), hang out at WalMart (tending to look like 'People of WalMart'), and go to 'clubs'. If you can't afford a nice house in a good area, you have to live among those in The World of Darkness.
Moving out into the countryside (unless you can afford a whole farm) means moving among even scarier people. Out in the countryside is where the meth labs and 'weed'-growing operations are. And try finding nice kids for your kids to play with. Affluent people (you know, the two incomes and two good careers households) can drive thirty miles to the next nice family's house, for play dates. They can drive thirty miles to the private academy. They can drive forty (or a hundred) miles to go to shop in Madison or Flowood or Northeast Jackson. At only fifty cents a mile, those little trips add up. And those who can afford comfortable lives in Mississippi put twenty or thirty thousand miles a year on every one of the family's vehicles. To church, to the grocery, to the private school, to soccer practice.... I don't see how it will cost you under ten thou a year, just to keep your car on the road in Mississippi. Most people who have nice lives there spend way more than that.
Oh! And if you have to go to a medical specialist, you may end up driving, regularly, to somewhere in the Jackson Metro. Plenty people in the Delta routinely drive a hundred miles, one way, to go see their doctor. Add that sort of thing into 'Cost of Living'. That's two hundred miles, at fifty cents a mile (rounding down a whole lot). A hundred bucks, every week, just to get to your treatment. Can you handle that, should the need arise?
Too, imagine yourself a young female who just got knocked-up by some boys out in the woods (happens...). Now, imagine being poor and needing an abortion. One clinic in the state offers that, and even this is iffy. Just getting to Jackson is a biggie. Add that into 'Cost of Living'.
Zerhacke is right about the car situation, too. When we were young and struggling, we drove used Volvos. Finding one at a good price was next to impossible. We'd look for YEARS, and finally would have to go to Houston or Memphis to find a car. Even cars you'd think would be abundant are not. A friend was trying to find a used Towncar, and couldn't. Used cars tend to be ridiculously overpriced in Mississippi, and the selection is beyond dismal.
I haven't really compared, but utilities and groceries are supposedly more expensive in Mississippi, too. Friends keep commenting on those differences, when they've moved away, or have moved back. Add in the cost of getting to whatever it is you want (there are lots of great things in Mississippi, but they're very spread-out), and you will see that the apparent decrease in Cost of Living is really just an illusion.
Oh, and trying to find a decent apartment is no easy thing. Frankly, if you don't have the bucks and credit to buy a house, you're looking at a less-than-pretty picture.
And as for 'services' and public transportation, I think you'll find it's not going to be a bed of roses. Most of the cities are falling apart, and mismanaged to a startling degree. Before we moved away, there was a man in a wheelchair, stranded on Jackson's side of County Line Road for AN ENTIRE AFTERNOON, calling with is cellphone, for a handicap bus. No response from 'transit'. Finally, that night, the police from across the road, in Ridgeland, used one of their own personal vehicles to rescue the poor man, after they saw him, sitting there on the sidewalk, ON THE EVENING NEWS. That's right! Camera crews managed to get there, but not 'Jackson Transit'. And Jackson is not the worst-run town in the state. Other towns have packs of wild dogs running loose, raw sewage in the water...
Oh! And if your money supply is not reliable enough to ensure a car with good air conditioning and keeping the air conditioning in your house in good repair, then you are in for much misery, come summertime.
Last edited by GrandviewGloria; 02-06-2013 at 12:00 PM..
Oh, so true! There are reasons Mississippi wins titles like 'Worst place in America to be a woman' and 'Worst place in America to be a Child'. Move there, and those reasons will reveal themselves rather quickly.
It's a lovely place to live if you're smart, hard-working, have a good and reliably-marketable degree (or are going in farming with your daddy - or are going to work in his insurance agency or at his farm equipment dealership), have a good spouse to help with the bills, were born into a local network of friends and family, and live in a one of the many nice neighborhoods filled with nice houses (and can afford private schools for your kids).
Otherwise, you will be knocked flat by a wave of bleakness and hopelessness. Can you say "stranded"?
In the towns, there are nice areas where people are pretty close to perfect, and then there are the areas where bad boys roam about, breaking into cars, breaking into houses, assaulting the elderly... It's like the dichotomy in 'Demian', by Hermann Hesse: The World of Light, versus The World of Darkness. On one side are the winners, the non-smokers, the non-drinkers, those who go to the better churches, who spend their time fashioning lovely homes with lovely yards, who raise their children just-right and send them to private schools. On the other side are the Rickys and Tawnyas who watch a lot of cable TV, smoke like chimneys, go to the iffy churches, don't count "420" as 'doing drugs' ("Thayitt ain't druuuuuigs!!! everbawdi smawks uh liiiidle wuaeeeeid."), hang out at WalMart, and go to 'clubs'. If you can't afford a nice house in a good area, you have to live among those in The World of Darkness.
Moving out into the countryside (unless you can afford a whole farm) means moving among even scarier people. Out in the countryside is where the meth labs and 'weed'-growing operations are. And try finding nice kids for your kids to play with. Affluent people (you know, the two incomes and two good careers households) can drive thirty miles to the next nice family's house, for play dates. They can drive thirty miles to the private academy. They can drive forty (or a hundred) miles to go to shop in Madison or Flowood or Northeast Jackson. At only fifty cents a mile, those little trips add up. And those who can afford comfortable lives in Mississippi put twenty or thirty thousand miles a year on every one of the family's vehicles. To church, to the grocery, to the private school, to soccer practice.... I don't see how it will cost you under ten thou a year, just to keep your car on the road in Mississippi. Most people who have nice lives there spend way more than that.
Zerhacke is right about the car situation, too. When we were young and struggling, we drove used Volvos. Finding one at a good price was next to impossible. We'd look for YEARS, and finally would have to go to Houston or Memphis to find a car. Even cars you'd think would be abundant are not. A friend was trying to find a used Towncar, and couldn't. Used cars tend to be ridiculously overpriced in Mississippi, and the selection is beyond dismal.
I haven't really compared, but utilities and groceries are supposedly more expensive in Mississippi, too. Friends keep commenting on those differences, when they've moved away, or have moved back. Add in the cost of getting to whatever it is you want (there are lots of great things in Mississippi, but they're very spread-out), and you will see that the apparent decrease in Cost of Living is really just an illusion.
Oh, and trying to find a decent apartment is no easy thing. Frankly, if you don't have the bucks and credit to buy a house, you're looking at a less-than-pretty picture.
And as for 'services' and public transportation, I think you'll find it's not going to be a bed of roses. Most of the cities are falling apart, and mismanaged to a startling degree. Before we moved away, there was a man in a wheelchair, stranded on Jackson's side of County Line Road for AN ENTIRE AFTERNOON, calling with is cellphone, for a handicap bus. No response from 'transit'. Finally, that night, the police from across the road, in Ridgeland, used their own vehicles to rescue the poor man. Jackson is not the worst-run town in the state.
Oh! And if your money supply is not reliable enough to ensure a car with good air conditioning and keeping the air conditioning in your house in good repair, then you are in for much misery, come summertime.
Mississippi is a society of contrasts. You have the few wealthy, and then you have the very poor. There is a middle class here. However, the divides here are very strong. And like I said before, alot of this has been in place since the plantation days. You had the few wealthy, but a large part of the population was poor, under-educated, and living in a rural society. Mississippi has attracted some companies, capitalizing on the low wages. I would say Mississippi is what it is today because of its history. I would say things are not run right because of that.
Yes, the cost of living is much lower here. That really has little to do with the question of "are wages that low?". The answer to that question is that yes, wages in this state really are that low. However, the cost of living index for this state as an average means that you don't have to make anywhere near the same amount of money you did in Chicago to live the same lifestyle.
There's another caveat, though. While your comfortable lifestyle in Chicago included such things as reliable electrical supply, worthwhile education systems for your children, automobiles that you can depend on, and safe and sane housing, you can easily run into problems locating that in this state.
You'll end up paying roughly the same percentage of your income to survive in this state as you do in Chicago, but your quality of living is going to suffer a horrible, crippling, agonizing death.
Really? Safe and sane housing in Chicago on a low wage budget?
Oh, so true! There are reasons Mississippi wins titles like 'Worst place in America to be a woman' and 'Worst place in America to be a Child'. Move there, and those reasons will reveal themselves rather quickly.
It's a lovely place to live if you're smart, hard-working, have a good and reliably-marketable degree (or are going in farming with your daddy - or are going to work in his insurance agency or at his farm equipment dealership), have a good spouse to help with the bills, were born into a local network of friends and family, and live in a one of the many nice neighborhoods filled with nice houses (and can afford private schools for your kids).
Otherwise, you will be knocked flat by a wave of bleakness and hopelessness. Can you say "stranded"?
In the towns, there are nice areas where people are pretty close to perfect, and then there are the areas where bad boys roam about, breaking into cars, breaking into houses, assaulting the elderly... It's like the dichotomy in 'Demian', by Hermann Hesse: The World of Light, versus The World of Darkness. On one side are the winners, the non-smokers, the non-drinkers, those who go to the better churches, who spend their time fashioning lovely homes with lovely yards, who raise their children just-right and send them to private schools. On the other side are the Rickys and Tawnyas who watch a lot of cable TV, smoke like chimneys, go to the iffy churches, don't count "420" as 'doing drugs' ("Thayitt ain't druuuuuigs!!! everbawdi smawks uh liiiidle wuaeeeeid."), hang out at WalMart (tending to look like 'People of WalMart'), and go to 'clubs'. If you can't afford a nice house in a good area, you have to live among those in The World of Darkness.
Moving out into the countryside (unless you can afford a whole farm) means moving among even scarier people. Out in the countryside is where the meth labs and 'weed'-growing operations are. And try finding nice kids for your kids to play with. Affluent people (you know, the two incomes and two good careers households) can drive thirty miles to the next nice family's house, for play dates. They can drive thirty miles to the private academy. They can drive forty (or a hundred) miles to go to shop in Madison or Flowood or Northeast Jackson. At only fifty cents a mile, those little trips add up. And those who can afford comfortable lives in Mississippi put twenty or thirty thousand miles a year on every one of the family's vehicles. To church, to the grocery, to the private school, to soccer practice.... I don't see how it will cost you under ten thou a year, just to keep your car on the road in Mississippi. Most people who have nice lives there spend way more than that.
Oh! And if you have to go to a medical specialist, you may end up driving, regularly, to somewhere in the Jackson Metro. Plenty people in the Delta routinely drive a hundred miles, one way, to go see their doctor. Add that sort of thing into 'Cost of Living'. That's two hundred miles, at fifty cents a mile (rounding down a whole lot). A hundred bucks, every week, just to get to your treatment. Can you handle that, should the need arise?
Too, imagine yourself a young female who just got knocked-up by some boys out in the woods (happens...). Now, imagine being poor and needing an abortion. One clinic in the state offers that, and even this is iffy. Just getting to Jackson is a biggie. Add that into 'Cost of Living'.
Zerhacke is right about the car situation, too. When we were young and struggling, we drove used Volvos. Finding one at a good price was next to impossible. We'd look for YEARS, and finally would have to go to Houston or Memphis to find a car. Even cars you'd think would be abundant are not. A friend was trying to find a used Towncar, and couldn't. Used cars tend to be ridiculously overpriced in Mississippi, and the selection is beyond dismal.
I haven't really compared, but utilities and groceries are supposedly more expensive in Mississippi, too. Friends keep commenting on those differences, when they've moved away, or have moved back. Add in the cost of getting to whatever it is you want (there are lots of great things in Mississippi, but they're very spread-out), and you will see that the apparent decrease in Cost of Living is really just an illusion.
Oh, and trying to find a decent apartment is no easy thing. Frankly, if you don't have the bucks and credit to buy a house, you're looking at a less-than-pretty picture.
And as for 'services' and public transportation, I think you'll find it's not going to be a bed of roses. Most of the cities are falling apart, and mismanaged to a startling degree. Before we moved away, there was a man in a wheelchair, stranded on Jackson's side of County Line Road for AN ENTIRE AFTERNOON, calling with is cellphone, for a handicap bus. No response from 'transit'. Finally, that night, the police from across the road, in Ridgeland, used one of their own personal vehicles to rescue the poor man, after they saw him, sitting there on the sidewalk, ON THE EVENING NEWS. That's right! Camera crews managed to get there, but not 'Jackson Transit'. And Jackson is not the worst-run town in the state. Other towns have packs of wild dogs running loose, raw sewage in the water...
Oh! And if your money supply is not reliable enough to ensure a car with good air conditioning and keeping the air conditioning in your house in good repair, then you are in for much misery, come summertime.
Glad I don't live in that part of MS lol. On the coast, the transit system runs frequent enough AND on time. My credit is shot, but I have lived in good housing (my standards are high) paying $555 (Before Katrina) $700 & $900. I also have friends that pay $600 & $650 and their houses are nice, big & in decent neighborhoods. I didn't have a problem find my used suv, very good price, and I talked the price down too. Now, I've only lived on the coast so I really can't speak for other areas of MS, never even visited lol...but I can say my standard of living is better in MS than other places I've lived...and as far as utilities, I just did a comparison, FL: electric summer about $250 a month, winter $125...MS: summer: didn't go above 200 and winter $55-70
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