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http://money.cnn.com/2018/05/17/news/economy/us-middle-class-basics-study/index.html
"Nearly 51 million households don't earn enough to afford a monthly budget that includes housing, food, child care, health care, transportation and a cell phone, according to a study released Thursday by the United Way ALICE Project. That's 43% of households in the United States."
The figure includes the 16.1 million households living in poverty, as well as the 34.7 million families that the United Way has dubbed ALICE -- Asset Limited, Income Constrained, Employed. This group makes less than what's needed "to survive in the modern economy."
"Despite seemingly positive economic signs, the ALICE data shows that financial hardship is still a pervasive problem," said Stephanie Hoopes, the project's director.
California, New Mexico and Hawaii have the largest share of struggling families, at 49% each. North Dakota has the lowest at 32%.
Many of these folks are the nation's child care workers, home health aides, office assistants and store clerks, who work low-paying jobs and have little savings, the study noted. Some 66% of jobs in the US pay less than $20 an hour.
(Score: 5, Informative) by Oakenshield on Monday May 21 2018, @02:00PM (11 children)
Just a FYI: My cell phone cost averages about $24 per month, taxes included. I have Google Fi as my provider and I use about 150MB of data per month, mostly Google Maps in the car. I provide both my kids a cell phone for about $17 per month each (taxes included) through Republic Wireless with no data at all. We all have unlimited calling and texting across the US. All combined, I still pay less than what I used to pay the bastards at AT&T for my unlimited local landline plan with a handful of long distance calls. Checking AT&T's site, it would cost me $62+taxes for an unlimited local/long distance landline today. I no longer have a paid landline.
If you pay $34 or more for your landline, you can have two cell phones with unlimited calling for the same or less cost and jettison your landline. You don't have to sell your soul to Verizon or AT&T.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by GreatAuntAnesthesia on Monday May 21 2018, @02:16PM (3 children)
This.
Also worth noting, more and more services are online only theses days. Increasingly difficult to access your bank, since they are closing branches, reducing opening hours and reducing call centre staff/ quality.
More and more government services are moving online, and the offices where you used to access them (post offices, job centres etc) are being closed.
Rising car ownership costs mean that going to buy groceries in person at the supermarket is becoming less and less accessible. Sure, you could walk to the local corner shop, but then you have to pay 20% more for your food. Online shopping will eventually become a necessity.
Point is, internet access in the modern (first) world is less and less a luxury and more and more a necessity. Without it you risk becoming completely marginalised, pushed to the fringes of society. Therefore I don't begrudge the younger generation their phones. You can't expect people to live they way you did when you were a youngster with an onion on your belt, the world has changed.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 21 2018, @02:33PM (2 children)
I don't have a car, do most of my shopping online, work online...spend most of my life online, but don't have a cellphone. Split among roommates, my share of the internet bill comes to less than $20/month.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by GreatAuntAnesthesia on Monday May 21 2018, @02:59PM (1 child)
Well that's very nice for you, but that's just not how the youngsters do it.
They don't see the point in buying / owning a computer + screen +landline + home broadband when they live in tiny, overpriced apartments where every bit of money and every square centimetre of space is at a premium. Why tie yourself to a box and a cable in your home when you could be looking stuff up on the move? Being able to access local information (bus times, weather, business opening times...) when out and about is really handy. One little gadget in your pocket (and you can pick up a refurbed, low end smartphone very cheap now) and a monthly (preferably sim-only) payment for both phone and internet and that's all you need. If I were in their shoes, it's exactly what I'd do.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 22 2018, @01:53AM
In the words of master Yoda: "That is why they fail."
(Score: 1) by suburbanitemediocrity on Monday May 21 2018, @02:37PM (4 children)
Get a Garmin GPS. It doesn't rely on subscriptions.
(Score: 2) by Oakenshield on Monday May 21 2018, @02:44PM (3 children)
I had a TomTom and gave it to my daughter when she was going cross country. Unless you have "free" map updates, it goes out of date fairly quickly. Besides, I actually use Waze for the police reports.
(Score: 1) by suburbanitemediocrity on Tuesday May 22 2018, @02:03AM (2 children)
My 8 year old never updated GPS has only been wrong, maybe 3 times and I've done a couple dozen cross country trips (3/4 corners and both coasts)and nothing that I couldn't figure out myself with a few seconds of critical thinking skills, eg, don't turn down the oneway street. That was Seattle. The other one I remember was a missing road in Nebraska, but I was going the right direction and it sorted itself out in an hour.
They don't build roads that fast and I don't see where it "goes out of date fairly quickly." Up until ten years ago, people used paper maps and billions upon billions of successful trips have been made. Talk about missing, outdated information.
(Score: 2) by Oakenshield on Tuesday May 22 2018, @02:35PM (1 child)
I guess they aren't building (or renaming streets) very fast near you. When I started having frequent trouble entering "non-existent" addresses which Google had no trouble finding, I dropped my TomTom in a drawer. The subscription cost to update maps was close to what I paid in the first place. I gave it to my daughter because although she primarily used her phone for maps, she anticipated lots of places on the road where she would have no cell coverage.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Thursday May 24 2018, @02:27AM
Welcome to most of the US.
(Score: 1, Troll) by SanityCheck on Monday May 21 2018, @09:17PM (1 child)
or
The cost is hidden. You think you use 150 MB, but in fact you provide them with 150MB of product they sell.
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 22 2018, @02:38PM
I see your modded a troll but i think your just a apple fanboi faggot