&gt; The US is a rich country<p>And it was almost identically rich 20 years ago.  Actually, since the national debt keeps going up, and we&#x27;ve engaged in multiple wars since then, a case could be made that we&#x27;re worse off.<p>&gt; National wealth is having enough ambient wealth in every single community so that starvation is really rare.<p>So, maybe what you meant to say was, &quot;I&#x27;d rather be what most people consider to be poor today (as long as I got to live in the United States), than rich twenty years ago.&quot;<p>&gt; Our country has only gotten richer and richer in the last thirty years.<p>I disagree.  We had the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression.  People were genuinely hurting.  Employment among many groups (such as &quot;poor&quot; laborers) hasn&#x27;t rebounded.  Meanwhile, 20 years ago was in the middle of a boom.<p>&gt; I&#x27;d rather lose everything and become homeless today<p>...as long as it&#x27;s in the United States.  (Which you did not clarify in the first place.)<p>&gt;  I&#x27;m not making that decision for everybody. Just me.<p>Sure, but you presented your argument as rational, not just personal.  And then for some reason you were BOTHERED that I tried to understand your position.  Why state your position, if you don&#x27;t want other people to take it seriously and try to understand it?<p>&gt; Barrels of cash aren&#x27;t all that hard to come by.<p>All evidence points to GENERATIONAL poverty being the norm.  So, yes, wealth IS that hard to come by.<p>&gt; Massive national wealth isn&#x27;t...<p>Far out.  So, as a rich person 20 years ago, you&#x27;d move to the nation with the greatest national wealth.<p>&gt; But my point is that national wealth created both the option to have heart surgery and the ability to have it relatively cheaply.<p>And my point is that TWENTY YEARS AGO, the United States wasn&#x27;t THAT different than it is today.  In fact, relative to median income, the same medical procedures cost more today (even adjusting for inflation) than they did back then.  By a LOT.  And most outcomes aren&#x27;t proportionally better.  We&#x27;re still way behind in life expectancy and infant mortality, for instance.<p>&gt;  as if I don&#x27;t know the difference or something<p>No, I&#x27;m trying to understand your statement, &quot;I&#x27;d rather be poor today than rich twenty years ago.&quot;  I&#x27;m trying to actively listen, and keep asking you if I&#x27;m understanding you correctly, even to the definitions of each of those words &quot;poor&quot; that I use in my head.<p>&gt; But again, the only thing that really solves the poor&#x27;s problems is national wealth. There&#x27;s not enough liquid wealth to spread around to stop poverty.<p>That&#x27;s a great assertion to digest, and I don&#x27;t buy it.  There are nomadic people, to this day, living in areas of Africa we&#x27;d be tempted to call a desert, who work less than 10 hours a week gathering food, seeking shelter.  They spend the rest of their days lounging, chatting, teaching their children.  If there is enough food and water to provide for a population, everything else is relative, isn&#x27;t it?  They even take care of their neighbors when they are sick.<p>&gt; Hehehe, good thing you live in a country where the things that can seriously test that belief in unconditionality generally don&#x27;t happen.<p>Let me imagine the worst imaginable environment - I&#x27;m a Jew, living in Nazi Germany.  I think my friends and family still unconditionally love me.  Are you convinced they don&#x27;t?<p>&gt; Totalitarian states insert politics into families specifically to keep these sorts of bonds from giving communities the power to resist the state.<p>So, again, I think you should have said, &quot;I&#x27;d rather be what most people consider to be poor today (as long as I got to live in the United States), than rich twenty years ago.&quot;<p>Because if you and I made a list of all of the poor people in the world today, I think you&#x27;d be forced to agree that MOST of them live in places you would not ever want to live.  No national wealth.  Totalitarian government.  Warlords.  Corruption.  Not enough food and water.  No opportunities for employment, or education.  No internet.<p>&gt; In case you missed my point, it&#x27;s that just about everything you think of as &#x27;you&#x27;, your life, your wealth, your family, your very mind, is a product of the country you live in.<p>In case you missed my point, the US twenty years ago isn&#x27;t THAT different from the US today, to offset the difference between being able to financially provide for my family, and NOT.<p>&gt; the options people have available to pull themselves out of poverty<p>But they don&#x27;t.  All the data says you&#x27;re EXTREMELY likely to have the same wealth as your parents.<p>I think, in order for your assertion to make any sense, you must believe that most people are poor because they&#x27;re not as motivated as you are.  I&#x27;m not even trying to load that statement, or put judgement on it.  That&#x27;s the only way I can make sense of what you&#x27;ve said.<p>&gt; There is a ton of attention being paid to the actual problems both poor people and ACTUALLY POOR people are having, and a lot of resources devoted to promising options.<p>I don&#x27;t buy it.  Even our beloved veterans are homeless, unemployed, and suicidal.  I&#x27;ll think the options are promising when they start to have an impact.  And I mention veterans, because even Conservatives claim to want to use government to help poor people, as long as they&#x27;re veterans.  But we still haven&#x27;t put a dent in it.<p>&gt; I made an assertion concerning my own convictions that you are taking out of context.<p>No, you made an assertion, and I want to discuss it, to see if it was rational, and to try to gain knowledge from whatever perspective you have.<p>&gt; Most of those volunteering in soup kitchens are closer to the people they&#x27;re serving than they are to you.<p>Most of the people stocking soup kitchens are more like me.  Disposable income, secure in their career.  And twenty years ago, there were more people like that (relative to population size), than there are today.  The middle is shrinking.<p>&gt; And the things rich people try to do to help the less well-off often boil down to ego gratification and do no real good.<p>A rich person is CAPABLE of doing everything a poor person can.  You may be right that the rich need to be educated.<p>&gt; I can&#x27;t even begin to try to convince you because the very way you think about wealth is utterly silly.<p>&#x2F;sigh<p>Thanks for the insult.<p>WHY BOTHER talking, if you don&#x27;t ENJOY talking with people who think differently than you?  SERIOUSLY?