One man's trash is another man's treasure or put another way, if you're down, I want to put my boot heal on your neck and "punish" you further. You are not really poor unless you live in a cardboard box. It's the law of the conservative jungle. I don't know anyone who's a self-made man, especially those in the lucky sperm club, everyone that's fortunate gets some help along the way. MC

"In a 2003 editorial in The Washington Times, Bruce Bartlett wrote, "In a supplementary report that got no press attention, the Census Bureau looked at some of these new necessities and their ownership by the poor. It turns out many poor people today own appliances that were considered luxuries when I grew up, and some that would still be considered luxuries today. For example, 91 percent of those in the lowest 10 percent of households—all officially poor—own color TVs, 74 percent own microwave ovens, 55 percent own VCRs, 47 percent own clothes dryers, 42 percent own stereos, 23 percent own dishwashers, 21 percent own computers and 19 percent own garbage disposals. When I grew up in the 1950s, only the wealthy owned color TVs, clothes dryers, stereos, dishwashers and disposals. These were all considered luxuries. We got by with black-and-white TVs, hanging our wet clothes on a line to dry, washing dishes by hand and throwing our potato peels in a pail instead of down the drain. So did most other middle-class families. Not even the wealthiest people owned microwave ovens, VCRs or computers." [39]"

http://en.wikipedia.org:80/wiki/Poverty_in_the_United_States