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Could you live off of $438 a week?
What's it like to live in poverty? Unless you've been there, it's hard to know. But every day, millions of Americans have to make tough choices about how they will survive, what they will eat, and where they will live. When you have very little money, the financial decisions you are forced to make are not only difficult, but also life changing.
Marketplace Money -- in collaboration with the Wealth and Poverty Desk and KPBS in San Diego -- have focused on these important decisions in a special called "Tough Choices" airing this weekend on Public Radio stations and the Marketplace Money Podcast.
One story from the show explores how people who are not poor can experience what it's like to live in poverty. They take part in a nationwide Poverty Simulator, a real-life workshop that requires them to face the tough choices that people make when living at or below the poverty threshold.
The Poverty Simulator program is intensive, but we've condensed the experience into a simple interactive game above. Try it out above to see if you can get by supporting a family of four on just $22,811 in a year.
SPECIAL REPORT: Listen and read more stories and interviews from the Marketplace Money special report, "Tough Choices." Read more.
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Tried the www.playspent.org, but after only 19 days I had a car crash, speeding ticket, sick mother, stole gas, needed a root canal and a dead grandfather, I decide that if this would be dead in another few weeks are stopped playing. It seemed less like a Poverty Simulation and just left reality. Even in the most accident pron areas in the US, the odd of getting in an accident is ~1 in 60. A person needing a root canal is 1 in 216 for any month. And so on.
Thank you CLBurnett for your insight and Marketplace for bringing poverty issues into the discussion of the economy. CLBurnett hits it right on the head - the central issue is dignity. No one should be robbed of their dignity because of their health or their wealth status, but the reality is that public policy simply isn't based on whether it ensures everyone - regardless of whether we've been lucky enough to be healthy or experience other privileges - can live our lives in dignity. But wouldn't it be a better place for us all to live if the dignity of each of us was considered? Paul Wellstone was fond of saying "we all do better when we all do better." I think that's true.
Though provoking and realistic.
55, I ran a computer store from 1980 to 1997, took some contract jobs, was a network administrator in downtown chicago, was laid off, and took unenployment.
I was lucky, we bought our house at fair price and so we were able to send both kids to college using the Bright Start Program ( thank god for the program ).
Now my daughter is working and married and my son is on the west coast looking for another job.
My wife, a nurse, has been steadily employed and is incredibly patient about the situation.
So to all out there, there are jobs out there, just don't give up.
I intend to die in front of a computer screen ( they still exist ) than in a hospital bed.
Jacob
poverty simulator is insulting. i listen to marketplace every day, and swear by it, but this one made me start an account and log in to comment for the first time. i have lived on $400 or less per week for decades, and i'm only a single person. i know many families of four who could never make ends meet on this amount. rent or mortgages alone would wipe them out. add in daycare, healthcare, car expenses, utilities, food, etc., and you've got the dilemma much of hard-working america lives with every day, IF they're lucky enough to have jobs at all. add one major catastrophic crisis, and that's it. the idea that well-off people with cushy condos and positions can play a game of poverty, feel all sympathetic for a while, and then go back to their complacent lifestyles, is an outrage and absurd. just the fact that they know it's someone else's reality, not theirs, makes it a farce. sure, it's heartwarming if some landlord learns to make a concession or two, but it's never going to be life-changing, in the way real poverty crushes you relentlessly into humiliation and despair. it's not an activity you can try out and then check out of when it gets too uncomfortable. that's all i have to say.
Let me tell you about living on $244.00 week or $976.00 a month. Let me tell you about the real life, not simulated, day after day, month after month, living well below the poverty line.
Multiple Sclerosis is the disease that robbed me of my life and dignity. I am not complaining, I am grateful for the amount of disability I receive. But if you want real information about poverty follow a few of us disabled folks around and see how we manage. I do receive $16.00 (sixteen dollars) a month in food stamp benefits. I also have Medicare. But I haven't seen a dentist in over 12 years because there is no low cost dental care available. We have a county dentist but a year waiting list to get an appointment. My teeth are all broken and cracked. They hurt. People make remarks about the broken teeth but I can't get a loan for dental work or credit at the dentist's office. I couldn't pay it back. I go to the food banks for extra food. I shop at the Salvation Army for clothes and shoes. I do have a Lifeline cell phone for emergencies.
Try living like this for years on end. No drugs, no alcohol, no cable, no electronic entertainment, none of the normal diversions in life. No vacations, no extras. Everything goes to utilities and food. But there are good friends in the MS community, and thank God for free books at the public library. I do volunteer to help those even less fortunate through some other organizations.
So I appreciate you all trying to experience poverty first hand. Try it for a year. Try looking for a job in this economy. Try deciding if you buy 20 packs of Oodles of Noodles or splurge and buy a bag of apples. It is tough to eat a healthy diet of fresh fruit and veggies when you've only got a few dollars for the entire month. It can be done. We disabled are living proof.
And the up side is I do hope I can find a job soon. And a dentist.
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