> Take someone who makes $15/hr and someone who makes $16/hr. Both are poor. Both live paycheck to paycheck, have no savings, etc. But theoretically, couldn't the latter person live exactly like the first one, and save $2000/yr?
Emergency expenses are generally not the same for different people
> Or, consider the same person from one year to the next. Expenses are lumpy. They begin the year at $0 and they end the next year at $0. It seems... unbelievably coincidental, I guess?... that they happened to earn the exact amount of money they needed.
If you need $x per year and only earn $x-y per year... you're going to end up with $0 at the end of the year and not have your needs met.
> The second part is that I've heard it's expensive to be poor. You get crappy stuff that breaks and needs replacement more often. You can't afford the larger, cheaper-per-ounce item at the grocery store, so you're paying more for the smaller things. The flip side is that if that's true, it provides kind of a ramp out, since as you're able to save, you can use your money more efficiently and save more.
Saving is difficult - as mentioned before, emergency expenses come up. And it's very hard to break that mindset ("I could buy this more expensive version but I need this money for other things too")
Emergency expenses are generally not the same for different people
> Or, consider the same person from one year to the next. Expenses are lumpy. They begin the year at $0 and they end the next year at $0. It seems... unbelievably coincidental, I guess?... that they happened to earn the exact amount of money they needed.
If you need $x per year and only earn $x-y per year... you're going to end up with $0 at the end of the year and not have your needs met.
> The second part is that I've heard it's expensive to be poor. You get crappy stuff that breaks and needs replacement more often. You can't afford the larger, cheaper-per-ounce item at the grocery store, so you're paying more for the smaller things. The flip side is that if that's true, it provides kind of a ramp out, since as you're able to save, you can use your money more efficiently and save more.
Saving is difficult - as mentioned before, emergency expenses come up. And it's very hard to break that mindset ("I could buy this more expensive version but I need this money for other things too")