Dakotah Lindwurm is more impressive all the time.

$baby wrote:

Shocking Read wrote:

That was actually a really shocking read. I didn't realise that children could find themselves so quickly homeless in a first world country. For a child to spend time sleeping in a car is really detrimental to their development and I'll be surprised if it hasn't caused her issues that may arise one day. Likewise, her mother dying at only 49 and her young daughter having to nurse her instead of her going into hospital. It sounds more like the third world, but a really poor part of it.

There just isn't much of a safety net in the U.S. compared to other countries (16% of children in the U.S. are living in poverty which is atrocious (TWICE as high as other developed countries and both the infant mortality and maternal mortality rates are higher than basically any other OECD country)).

Medical services and prescription drugs cost much more than they do in other countries due to lack of universal healthcare coupled with the stranglehold that the pharmaceutical companies and insurance companies have on Congress (ex. insulin costs about 10x as much here per month than in Canada (98$ v. $12)). The U.S. spends $12,500 per capita on healthcare (TWICE as much as the average developed country). A whopping 78% of Americans live pay check to paycheck according to Forbes 2024 (a 6% increase from last year). So, unfortunately, this story did not shock me though I am very grateful that Dakotah chose to share it because it is really representative of some of the often overlooked struggles of many in this nation.

If you are a wealthy American, it is a good life. If you are not, good luck. No one ever talks about it (except politicians very briefly looking for votes and often not even then) but go to the rural Mississippi delta or coal mining country in West Virginia or the middle of nowhere potato Iowa farmland (you won't bc why would anyone want to?). It's a different world out there. Squint and you'd think you certainly weren't still in the(?) "global superpower" any longer.

As for the poster writing about child support, again you are looking at things from an economically privileged lens. The vast majority of divorced couples do not utilize the judicial system to enforce court-ordered child support. They don't have the resources to hire lawyers. They don't have the time to take off of work to get to and participate in the legal proceedings. They may fear retribution from their former partners. They often fear that their children will be placed into the foster care system (which is also really a mess, more on that another time). They may fear that other, unrelated criminal or misdemeanor charges will be identified during those proceedings (an unfathomable 33% of the American working age adult population has a criminal record (77 million ppl! of course this is unsurprising since we incarcerate over 20% of the WORLD's prisoners despite having 4.2% of the population)).

Anyway, as always, good luck to Dakotah in Paris. Rooting for her!

$baby wrote:

Shocking Read wrote:

That was actually a really shocking read. I didn't realise that children could find themselves so quickly homeless in a first world country. For a child to spend time sleeping in a car is really detrimental to their development and I'll be surprised if it hasn't caused her issues that may arise one day. Likewise, her mother dying at only 49 and her young daughter having to nurse her instead of her going into hospital. It sounds more like the third world, but a really poor part of it.

There just isn't much of a safety net in the U.S. compared to other countries (16% of children in the U.S. are living in poverty which is atrocious (TWICE as high as other developed countries and both the infant mortality and maternal mortality rates are higher than basically any other OECD country)).

Medical services and prescription drugs cost much more than they do in other countries due to lack of universal healthcare coupled with the stranglehold that the pharmaceutical companies and insurance companies have on Congress (ex. insulin costs about 10x as much here per month than in Canada (98$ v. $12)). The U.S. spends $12,500 per capita on healthcare (TWICE as much as the average developed country). A whopping 78% of Americans live pay check to paycheck according to Forbes 2024 (a 6% increase from last year). So, unfortunately, this story did not shock me though I am very grateful that Dakotah chose to share it because it is really representative of some of the often overlooked struggles of many in this nation.

If you are a wealthy American, it is a good life. If you are not, good luck. No one ever talks about it (except politicians very briefly looking for votes and often not even then) but go to the rural Mississippi delta or coal mining country in West Virginia or the middle of nowhere potato Iowa farmland (you won't bc why would anyone want to?). It's a different world out there. Squint and you'd think you certainly weren't still in the(?) "global superpower" any longer.

As for the poster writing about child support, again you are looking at things from an economically privileged lens. The vast majority of divorced couples do not utilize the judicial system to enforce court-ordered child support. They don't have the resources to hire lawyers. They don't have the time to take off of work to get to and participate in the legal proceedings. They may fear retribution from their former partners. They often fear that their children will be placed into the foster care system (which is also really a mess, more on that another time). They may fear that other, unrelated criminal or misdemeanor charges will be identified during those proceedings (an unfathomable 33% of the American working age adult population has a criminal record (77 million ppl! of course this is unsurprising since we incarcerate over 20% of the WORLD's prisoners despite having 4.2% of the population)).

Anyway, as always, good luck to Dakotah in Paris. Rooting for her!

$baby wrote:

Shocking Read wrote:

That was actually a really shocking read. I didn't realise that children could find themselves so quickly homeless in a first world country. For a child to spend time sleeping in a car is really detrimental to their development and I'll be surprised if it hasn't caused her issues that may arise one day. Likewise, her mother dying at only 49 and her young daughter having to nurse her instead of her going into hospital. It sounds more like the third world, but a really poor part of it.

There just isn't much of a safety net in the U.S. compared to other countries (16% of children in the U.S. are living in poverty which is atrocious (TWICE as high as other developed countries and both the infant mortality and maternal mortality rates are higher than basically any other OECD country)).

Medical services and prescription drugs cost much more than they do in other countries due to lack of universal healthcare coupled with the stranglehold that the pharmaceutical companies and insurance companies have on Congress (ex. insulin costs about 10x as much here per month than in Canada (98$ v. $12)). The U.S. spends $12,500 per capita on healthcare (TWICE as much as the average developed country). A whopping 78% of Americans live pay check to paycheck according to Forbes 2024 (a 6% increase from last year). So, unfortunately, this story did not shock me though I am very grateful that Dakotah chose to share it because it is really representative of some of the often overlooked struggles of many in this nation.

If you are a wealthy American, it is a good life. If you are not, good luck. No one ever talks about it (except politicians very briefly looking for votes and often not even then) but go to the rural Mississippi delta or coal mining country in West Virginia or the middle of nowhere potato Iowa farmland (you won't bc why would anyone want to?). It's a different world out there. Squint and you'd think you certainly weren't still in the(?) "global superpower" any longer.

As for the poster writing about child support, again you are looking at things from an economically privileged lens. The vast majority of divorced couples do not utilize the judicial system to enforce court-ordered child support. They don't have the resources to hire lawyers. They don't have the time to take off of work to get to and participate in the legal proceedings. They may fear retribution from their former partners. They often fear that their children will be placed into the foster care system (which is also really a mess, more on that another time). They may fear that other, unrelated criminal or misdemeanor charges will be identified during those proceedings (an unfathomable 33% of the American working age adult population has a criminal record (77 million ppl! of course this is unsurprising since we incarcerate over 20% of the WORLD's prisoners despite having 4.2% of the population)).

Anyway, as always, good luck to Dakotah in Paris. Rooting for her!