http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/in-america-why-the-poor-pay-dollar4158-for-a-dollar1500-%E2%80%98rent-to-own%E2%80%99-sofa/ar-BB9w32K
I don't know what I feel about this. I kind of feel sad that there are people out there struggling like this but most of this is their doing.
Yeah, it's their own doing -- I mean, the woman has a 9th grade education, which probably means a GED is out of her reach. Pretty much, kids are promoted regardless of achievement in elementary and middle school, so this means she probably wasn't passing anything . . . and then when she was presented with actual requirements in high school, she wasn't prepared. Kids who drop out in 9th grade tend to be genuinely pathetic academically.
It's also a hint that she's probably from generational poverty. Why? Because a middle-class family would've provided her with more support in elementary and middle school when they saw she wasn't thriving academically.
Would some budget-education help? Some families yes, but I think this family is "too far gone" to listen. They're too into their excuses. But that's who the news media chooses as their examples: They dig down deep to find the folks who look worst . . . and then pretend they're typical.
- Get a used couch for next to nothing off of craigslist?
The article said she couldn't save up enough to get a Craigslist couch, and that every time she tried to save, it ended up being used for something else.
I don't use Craigslist, but I know that a GoodWill sofa can be had for $50, and a yard sale sofa can be had for $20 -- and her weekly payments for just the couch were that much, so this excuse doesn't hold water. I suspect the reality is that she could've had a GoodWill sofa for $50, but it would've looked like it came from the 1970s.
Related note: The article said their old sofa was 6 years old and had springs sticking out. First thing that occurs to me is, put a blanket over the spring-issue and save 'til you can buy something decent. Second thought is, How does a sofa wear out that badly in 6 years? We bought a cheap-o sofa when we were younger (big mistake -- always buy quality for heavy-use furniture), and even though it looked bad in less than a year, it didn't literally fall to pieces, even with kids abusing it.
Even if I was "poor" for a while, I would still be middle class "on the inside", if that makes sense. I would still have a master's degree and a middle-class family and plenty of experience socializing and working with better-off people. I can relish things like driving an older car and having a cheap Windows phone instead of an iPhone because I know that people still aren't going to think I'm "lower class" or anything (or if a stranger did think that, IDGAF because I know I'm not).
I think you've hit upon a great deal of the issue. The woman in the article commented that she just wants "to feel like a normal family", and owning furniture is something normal families do.
She's externally motivated. If she doesn't have "the stuff" that a normal family does, she feels badly about herself.
I've said before that I was raised in a poor family, but we were very different from most in that we were first-generation poor. We didn't have this messed-up mindset; we could think ahead a bit.