'I'll Make Their Life Miserable': Tech CEO Bullies Low-income Vendors By His Home (theguardian.com) 524
An anonymous reader quotes an article on The Guardian that has caused a spark on social media: A Silicon Valley tech CEO has sparked backlash for comments slamming local fruit vendors, saying he would "make their life miserable" and "destroy" their produce if they were stationed near his house -- making him the latest wealthy Californian entrepreneur to publicly rail against low-income people. Mark Woodward, CEO of software company Invoca, published -- and later deleted -- a Facebook post saying that he would have no qualms about aggressively harassing unauthorized fruit sellers in his neighborhood if they got near his home. "I would go out there and make their life miserable. I would do whatever it took to make them leave. If that meant destroying some of their produce, or standing out there with signs to chase everyone away, Or just making them very uncomfortable, I would do that in a heartbeat."
And when we have no home no job no doctor (Score:5, Interesting)
And when we have no home no job no doctor. We will just hang at your place and go head and call the cops the jail will give us room and board + a doctor.
Re:And when we have no home no job no doctor (Score:5, Insightful)
And when we have no home no job no doctor. We will just hang at your place and go head and call the cops the jail will give us room and board + a doctor.
There are already people doing pretty much the same thing because they've fallen off the ladder. It costs way more to keep them in jail rather than help them get back on their feet.
Re:And when we have no home no job no doctor (Score:5, Insightful)
It costs way more to keep them in jail rather than help them get back on their feet.
Sure it would, and it could be done. But have you noticed that such things need to be a 'top-down' solution, but instead it seems like 'someone' keeps trying to force people closer to the bottom to solve it instead? It's almost like the rich want to keep reminding the rest of us that we shouldn't complain because it could be made much, much worse for us (e.g., we could be made to 'fall off the ladder', and end up jailed, in essence, for being jobless and homeless -- so you'd better keep your 'proper' place).
Re:And when we have no home no job no doctor (Score:5, Insightful)
It costs way more to keep them in jail rather than help them get back on their feet.
Sure it would, and it could be done. But have you noticed that such things need to be a 'top-down' solution, but instead it seems like 'someone' keeps trying to force people closer to the bottom to solve it instead? It's almost like the rich want to keep reminding the rest of us that we shouldn't complain because it could be made much, much worse for us (e.g., we could be made to 'fall off the ladder', and end up jailed, in essence, for being jobless and homeless -- so you'd better keep your 'proper' place).
Yeah and there's a lot of lobbying dollars behind those privatised prisons too , we can't be interrupting their profits with progressive laws!!!
Re: (Score:3)
Hell no! That would be cormanizzem.
Re:And when we have no home no job no doctor (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, I've known some rich people; they aren't necessarily assholes.
The problem is that a rich asshole is still an asshole, and unlike an ordinary asshole he's got an enormous societal and political footprint.
Re:And when we have no home no job no doctor (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3)
Also, your numbers suck, the 1% doesn't have 99% of the wealth.
Oh come on could we please knock off being so pedantic all the time? This is a casual discussion, we're not setting policy for the rest of the country here.
Now, then.. why wouldn't it work? The people and organizations at the top of the financial foodchain are the ones with the money, why shouldn't they be the ones who are paying to solve problems like homelessness, either directly, or through taxation? Why should the burden be put on people who don't have wealth? Explain your position.
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:3)
But still at the expense of the taxpayer. Housing/feeding/etc prisoners costs the private prisons money, so the government pays them money to do it (more than it costs, so the private prisons profit), and the government gets that money from the taxpayer (either current ones, or future ones via borrowing). One way or another keeping someone in prison costs taxpayer money; the fact that there's a parasitic private entity making it cost even more doesn't change that, it just makes it worse.
After all, it's not
Re:And when we have no home no job no doctor (Score:5, Insightful)
But still at the expense of the taxpayer
Yes, but the people who get the benefit are people who own things and so it's good solid American Capitalism(TM). We wouldn't want poor people to benefit from things funded by the taxpayer, that would be Evil Socialism(TM).
Re:And when we have no home no job no doctor (Score:5, Insightful)
It is unfathomable to me that an electorate can't recognize the conflict of interest that exists if prisons have a profit motive. Americans are very good at marketing. Americans have for profit prisons. American has by far the highest per capita incarceration rate. Do the math.
Re:And when we have no home no job no doctor (Score:5, Insightful)
And that's why when you hear anyone spout "responsibility" or "no more handouts", it's really code for "I'm rich, f**k you, lower my taxes".
Because welfare and other programs, yes, they are handouts, but they also try to keep people on the straight and narrow and try to help them stay on the right side of the law.
Cut them off, and they still need to eat - it's not like they're going to find a job because you cut them off (assuming they can hold a job). Instead of buying their food, they're just going to steal it. And steal everything else they need. Throw them in jail? Well, good for them.
It's just that while the rich lower their taxes by cutting them off, we end up paying for it still. The stores have to make up for the stolen goods, damaged stores, etc, so prices start rising in general. The poor get health care by ER, which is the most expensive health care around (seriously - if you could give them access to a doctor's clinic, you can save so much money - treatment by ER costs double to triple what a doctors office would charge), so we all pay in increased health care costs because they're using the most expensive form of health care we can provide. And then there's the whole justice thing - courts, police, jails, etc., taxes go up so we can house them. It costs over $100K per prisoner per year. And that doesn't even include intangible costs like the degradation of society.
Of course, the rich save because they don't live in areas that have to deal with these issues.
So it doesn't matter if you want to preach "responsibility" - you're not going to save money. Sure you save on your taxes, but you'll pay for it everywhere else. Sure it doesn't show up under a neat little line item, but that's just because it gets added up under a bunch of different other line items.
Re:And when we have no home no job no doctor (Score:5, Funny)
You're not factoring in that a lot of humans are sadists and get off on making life miserable for weaker humans, no matter how much it costs.
Re:And when we have no home no job no doctor (Score:4, Insightful)
He's factoring them in at the appropriate level. I.e., negligible in the course of any sane discussion of public policy.
Now maybe you were jockeying for a 'funny' mod, and it's whoever modded you 'insightful' that's the idiot here, but I've grown to appreciate the full range of pseudo-libertarian pseudo-thought on here, and can imagine that you really think pointing to sadists will somehow justify prisons as a solution to poverty. "All lives matter" bro. Right on!.
Re: (Score:3)
The problem is, how do you test for whether someone is a sociopath, and how do you keep the sociopaths who already have power from capturing that selection process to make sure anyone they don't like can't get into power.
Re: (Score:3)
The obvious solution is to just kill anyone caught stealing/etc.
And not in some costly process with appeals and crap like that, that shit runs even more than jailing them for life. Just shoot them on sight.
While we're at it, why bother paying some other poor person to do the shooting when we can pay some rich buddies to build a robot to do it for us.
We'll just put "do not kill" RFID chips in anyone who can afford to get them and the rest can be assumed poor and therefore criminal.
Bam, problem solved. Killbo
Re:And when we have no home no job no doctor (Score:5, Funny)
The obvious solution is to just kill anyone caught stealing/etc.
But then what would we do with all those empty Wall Street offices?
Re:And when we have no home no job no doctor (Score:4)
1. Governments have powers, not rights, so you're technically wrong while trying to be pedantic. Boo.
2. If "USA people" had always supported folk who actually needed help, we wouldn't have had tent cities in Central Park in the Great Depression, or any homelessness or other poverty problems ever. The fact that we obviously do and have had such problems proves that private charity does not fix them; if it did, they would be fixed already.
3. See above.
Re: (Score:3)
What does "fix" poverty? Please give us some examples where something was done and the result was no poverty any more.
Re: (Score:3)
Obviously, we haven't fixed poverty yet, because we still have poverty.
Which doesn't refute the point that private charity alone was never solution enough, because if it were, it would have fixed poverty. Since poverty isn't fixed yet, private charity isn't enough, and neither are any of the other solutions we've currently implemented.
(Which doesn't constitute an argument that we should stop those other solutions, any more than it would constitute an argument that we should stop all private charity, which n
Christ... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Christ... (Score:5, Funny)
No. An asshole has a USE. . .
Re: (Score:2)
Makes one want to go do donuts on his lawn, a fitting punishment for his particular crime.
Re:Christ... (Score:5, Insightful)
If he wanted the fruit vendors gone and they were truly unauthorized, then call the police on their non-emergency number. It's that simple. If the fruit vendor were authorized, then take it up with the city. Going there and destroy people's produce is destruction of property, which is vandalism or malicious mischief in California punishable by up to a year in prison.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
they were truly unauthorized
And there you have it, the same solution the asshole of the story wants. "I don't like what they are doing, lets require permits to earn a living"
This kind of nanny state solution is exactly why the Elites of the world (like this asshole) think they can control others.
Here's my thought. Is the road, sidewalk or otherwise public? Then ignore the whiny asshole. Fuck adding layers of additional government control on people, we have enough already. ENOUGH already. WHY must the solution to every whiny asshole be
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
The county has an easement to put and maintain a road across the front of my property. They can even make me pay to add a sidewalk when they get around to it.
I do in fact own half the road in front of my house. I 'marked' the four corners of the lot when I first bought the place! Can't stop people from driving down it, the road is public in a limited sense.
The county cannot simply permit a third party to build a business on my property. They would have to 'adverse posses' it first.
Re:Christ... (Score:5, Interesting)
Going there and destroy people's produce is destruction of property, which is vandalism or malicious mischief in California punishable by up to a year in prison.
I live in Texas, it is often punishable by death*. I'm not advocating DOING this, just pointing out exactly what you said. If we're just going to throw law and order out the window and inflict suffering on our fellow man because what they do annoys us. Doesn't really sound very nice, and certainly this will escalate. Incensed by a newly damaged lawn, our temper-challenged CEO will likely step this one up and retaliate. Someone will end up being hurt over unlicensed fruit sales.
* As long as you can find a way to couch it in the right terms under the castle doctrine or property crimes laws
Re: (Score:3)
Although I have to say he probably doesn't have that great of a lawn to start with given our nice little drought over here in CA.
Re: (Score:3)
So the only problem you see with his attitude is failure to outsource?
Re:Christ... (Score:4, Insightful)
What shouldn't happen is bringing your own brand of justice outside of the law. That's anarchy and it's not really good for anyone.
Re: (Score:2)
This loop doesn't live in a gated community, and his title already went to his head?
Re:Christ... (Score:5, Interesting)
CEO of a telemarketing company. What did you expect?
Re:Christ... (Score:4, Insightful)
Help me out (Score:4, Funny)
How should this thread play out? Are unlicensed vendors the noble poor today? Are we supposed to be pro-regulations or anti-regulations?
Re: (Score:2)
Not that simple (Score:5, Insightful)
There are some issues here that may apply. Is the vendor blocking traffic? Some placements will generate traffic congestion. That makes the vendor non-harmless. Is the vendor on private property without permission? That's a bad idea all around, not so much because "hey someone is selling stuff" but because it sets a negative precedent about the right to control what one owns. Blocking the sidewalk? That's no good either. The sidewalk seems to me to be something you can reasonably share -- it's public property, which means the vendor has a stake in it as well -- but if you block the sidewalk, you've gone too far. I don't think it's too much to ask that a vendor arrange their business such that the sidewalk and the road both remain traversible without requiring detour or delay.
I'm no fan of licenses per se, I think they are counter-productive on almost every level I can think of other than as a means of extracting money from the business community (and often that's counter productive as well), but if you're selling food, cooked or otherwise, I *am* a fan of inspection. If you haven't passed a recent inspection for handling, storage, cleanliness and refrigeration / prep as would be considered reasonable practice for whatever it is you are selling, I'd prefer you weren't allowed to sell, and if I can't have that, I'd at LEAST like to know about it so I can avoid your enterprise. Likewise healthcare, sexual services, etc. You should have the right to conduct business, but that should be tempered with the responsibility to do so in a safe and sane manner that takes the health and welfare of your customers into account as much as possible.
IMHO, most communities go way, way, too far when it comes to who can do what, where. And they do this to create "sanitized" zones where the "undesirables" are prevented from sullying the space they consider to be theirs. I find that attitude generally despicable if the space is public. If the space is private, then it should be 100% up to the owner, not the community, how that space is used. You want to spend a zillion bucks on a big house? Fine. Guy next to you wants to put up a rusty old junker on blocks right next to the property line? Fine. You don't like it? Should have bought more property (and perhaps less house) so your tender little eyes wouldn't have to suffer the indignity of photons you don't like. Some high fences would help too.
Anyway. It seems to me that the high road almost inevitably consists of giving your fellow human beings some room to exist and hopefully exercise some opportunity to improve their lot. I'm really pretty tired of "me first" explanations for what amounts to casual maltreatment of others. I understand and agree with concerns about private property you own. Beyond the boundaries of your own property, my sympathies for complaints about actions of others that do not directly pick your pocket or break your leg drop off dramatically.
Re: (Score:3)
I'm fine with that they just need to clean up for a few months when I'm ready to sell until then I'll enjoy the lower property taxes.
Re: (Score:3)
If I understand correctly, most home owners object to the neighbours putting rusty old junkers up on blocks in the yard not because it hurts their precious feelings but because it hurts their property values
I had an elderly neighbor complained to me about the dead petunias in my front yard, claiming that it took $50,000 off her home value. Never mind she wasn't selling her house. Some people get extremely obnoxious during a rising real estate market in California.
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Help me out (Score:5, Interesting)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
That is because you're an asshole of the same level as this CEO.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
So you want to plug that asshole with... what?
Re:Help me out (Score:5, Interesting)
Consider the source... (Score:5, Insightful)
...Invoca is a software company based in Santa Barbara, California that develops a Software as a Service platform for marketers...
Yeah, so, to guy is pretty much an asshat anyway.
Re: (Score:3)
Zoning laws are bad? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Zoning laws are bad? (Score:5, Insightful)
No, this isn't about zoning laws.
It's about America not being a computer program where all subroutines relate to each other by passing money as the only call parameter; it's a community of human beings that relate to each other on more complex levels than money most of the time.
It's about a guy seeing a phenomenon driven by poverty - you think they're breaking the law to be radical teen rebels or something? They're desperate. So he sees this phenomenon driven by poverty and his sole concern is himself and his comfort...in this case, his psychological comfort of knowing they aren't there...please note he wasn't complaining about noise or interference with his activities; he just hated the existence of poor people on his block.
And that's STILL absolutely OK, free country, he can have that opinion - hey, they're breaking the law and he's in the right to complain. The problem is that he's a CEO of a corporation, very much a representative of it, not just a private citizen. So he's basically saying, in the first person, PLURAL:
"In my company, we care only for ourselves and will use very ugly, unsociable bullying against those weaker than ourselves if they inconvenience us. Now please do business with us".
This is a news story not because he's an unpleasant neighbour and bad citizen, it's because he's a stupid CEO who just cost his company serious coin for no good reason at all.
Re:Zoning laws are bad? (Score:5, Insightful)
If they were breaking zoning laws and he was complaining about that, I don't think there would be as much outrage. He really crossed a line when he said it would be perfectly acceptable for him, personally, to harass the vendor or even destroy their produce until they left. If someone is breaking laws, you get the police to intervene. That's what they're paid for. This guy seems of the opinion that he can personally intervene even to the point of destroying private property and it's ok because he's rich and they're not. (He probably views the worst case scenario as: Throw some lawyers at the upset poor person so they either shut up or wind up losing what little they have.)
Re: (Score:2, Troll)
Or are you saying that poor people can ignore them because they're poor?
Or should a rich person deny public access to a public beach because they're rich?
http://sanfrancisco.cbslocal.com/2016/04/27/trial-ordered-over-public-access-to-vinod-khoslas-martins-beach/ [cbslocal.com]
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
It's pretty ridiculous that I as a software developer have virtually unlimited income potential working out of a $600 a month apartment, but other people have to struggle because zoning laws force them away from potential customers and force them to pay for a place to live and a place to work.
And their customers are forced to travel miles just to go buy simple things that they're neighbors could have more easily sold them.
I like to see people out looking to make an honest dollar.
The government is run by idi
Re: (Score:3)
Your zoning may vary. A huge segment of the population must drive to the nearest store.
Re: (Score:2)
You can't simply ignore the hypocrisy here. These are obviously people who are trying to earn their way and they aren't hurting anyone with their actions. Zoning is no more a factor here than it is for a door-to-door salesperson.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
I don't think there is great argument about zoning laws. A simple call to the police would have the problem resolved quickly. If he felt the need to deal with the problem at all.
The issue is his attitude and threats.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Excuse me?
Post one, just one, sensible, level headed reply to one of the batshit insane feminist demands (not even talking about anything coming close to Men's Rights bull, just normal, sane stuff) and prepare for impact.
It's a rant (Score:5, Insightful)
Should we pay attention to every rant? Even if it's a CEO of a company?
When I am ranting, I spew all kind of nonsense, threatening to exterminate all life on Earth, etc. Does it mean something beside the fact that I have a temper so hot that I can't restraint myself from public display of expressing it.
Public Figure Rant != Your Rant (Score:5, Insightful)
Look, I fully agree with your generalization because as a normal person I don't have to be concerned with a public image. Once you are in the public spotlight the game changes, and everything you do will be scrutinized because at that level you sell your image. Celebrities, including CEOs are not smarter than other people. Sometimes quite the opposite, because they get caught up in their image and neglect the basics.
It's like the guy in SF who publicly wanted to be a "thought leader" and then starts bashing homeless people. I have no sympathy for that person, because their goal was to be a public voice. The contract for selling your soul for loads of cash and public spotlights is messy. The next guy should be a whole lot more careful about what they say, and read the contract.
Re: (Score:2)
Should we pay attention to every rant? Even if it's a CEO of a company?
When I am ranting, I spew all kind of nonsense, threatening to exterminate all life on Earth, etc. Does it mean something beside the fact that I have a temper so hot that I can't restraint myself from public display of expressing it.
Galactus, is that you?
Re: (Score:2)
Galactus does not rant, puny human. He hungers.
Re: (Score:2)
Why yes, we must. Because CEOs are our betters in every way, they must hold some divine wisdom that we should be so lucky to be the recipients of should they so deign. /* You have the courage to tell the masses what no politician told them: you are inferior and all the improvements in your conditions which you simply take for granted you owe to the effort of men who are better than you. If this be arrogance, as some of your critics observed, it is still the truth that had to said in the age of the Welfare
Re: (Score:2)
Sure, but he posted on FaceBook. You have the decency to confine your hostile spew to Slashdot, where nobody will read it.
leadership team (Score:5, Funny)
"advertises its leadership team as the 'big brains and small egos creating amazing technology".
Re: (Score:3)
OFFTOPIC: Slashdot "disable ads" feature is gone (Score:4, Interesting)
Did anyone else notice the checkbox to disable ads for high karma users is now gone on Slashdot?
It stopped working a few weeks ago, and now it's just gone altogether.
Re: (Score:2)
Nope, I still have the option when I'm logged in.
Re: (Score:2)
I still have the checkbox on mine.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
I've still got it, but ticking it does nothing. It's back again on the next reload, unticked.
Submitting a comment doesn't add it to the discussion, either - it just goes "Working...". Reloading the page shows the comment, though.
Re: (Score:2)
Ditto.
On both Firefox and IE.
Re: (Score:2)
I've still got it, but ticking it does nothing. It's back again on the next reload, unticked.
Submitting a comment doesn't add it to the discussion, either - it just goes "Working...". Reloading the page shows the comment, though.
I noticed this too...I thought it was just me.
It just shows "Working" forever, but as you said, reloading the page shows the comment was added.
Re: (Score:2)
Did anyone else notice the checkbox to disable ads for high karma users is now gone on Slashdot?
It stopped working a few weeks ago, and now it's just gone altogether.
I still see it. I don't use it because I use Adblock, but it's still there at the top-right of the page.
Re: (Score:2)
It's been broken for ages. The new owners said it was something they'd look into. It's still broken. You only get the checkbox if you're "good". On the face it it, this means karma, but Slashdot admins have been known to fuck with users's post score, standing, and account permissions administratively (outside the user-controlled karma system), including the deletion of posts.
Channeling Cro Threadstrong (Score:3)
"FRUIT VENDOR!!! Your cart is still in our way! We will give you one more hour to move it from our area. Do not test our patience anymore!"
Re: (Score:3)
Does this fruit vendor not value his life? You are running out of time FRUIT VENDOR!!
Re: (Score:2)
They need to spread out like that. It's to have them available for any car chase that might pop up.
Mark Woodward, CEO of software company Invoca (Score:2)
The french had a great solution for rich assholes. (Score:2)
I really suggest it is done again to make these snooty asshats act more civilized. All it will take is couple of these rich assholes dangling from a noose on CNN with thousands of angry poor people below them cheering will suddenly make the rest of them across the country find their politeness filters and turn them back on almost instantly.
Re: (Score:2)
Normally I'd be against what you're suggesting...but sometimes (like today) I'm inclined to endorse it wholeheartedly, and maybe even open a KickStarter to fund such a project. All we need is a snappy name for it...
Damn (Score:2)
What a prick. How dare those people not be rich like him?
Sad... (Score:2)
It's a shame to hear things like this. If the fruit vendors are breaking zoning laws, then the proper civil authorities should take action. This does not excuse this type of attitude from him or others like him. I know disdain for the poor extends far beyond the "rich", we are all capable of being cold and uncaring, but not everyone is, thankfully. Even people who just ignore people struggling to make it, while perhaps not speaking ill of them are showing apathy by the lack of even caring.
We may not be lega
Dick move, but (Score:2)
It if really was an illegal fruit vendor, then I sorta wish it was easier for them to be legal fruit vendors. I don't know if things are different on the West
Proof that many rich folks live on another planet (Score:3)
Through luck and some hard work, my family and I are fortunate enough to be able to live in "the nice part of town." We're by no means rich; we make decent salaries, but we're not doctors or executives. Therefore we're always waiting for the career-instability shoe to drop and don't "act rich" for the most part. However, because we live in that nice part of town, we have a lot of interactions with people who are doctors, lawyers, executives and so on. A lot of them are nice normal people who just happen to have lots of money. They even let their kids hang out with ours! :-) But, there seems to come a point where someone just has so much that they turn into a clone of this guy. It's a small fraction of the population, but they're quite noticeable.
I've seen this in my job dealing with executives of large companies as well. Once you get to that level, everything in your life is taken care of for you. Your transportation is arranged for you, meals are handled, house is managed by a staff, family is cared for by a staff, and so on. Anything even slightly out of place like a street vendor is an emergency that needs to be dealt with immediately and harshly. This rant sounds like something a typical "new money" tech CEO would say to one of his friends, but now the world gets to hear how he really feels. It's just further proof that the executive crowd is completely disconnected from reality, and explains things like massive layoffs with no regard to the impact on the business or the individuals.
Let's male bash while we are at it. (Score:3, Insightful)
"They mark only the latest example of a male tech CEO making aggressive, insensitive and tone-deaf remarks about people less fortunate than them."
Really? Do we have to throw gender into this?
Re:Let's male bash while we are at it. (Score:4, Insightful)
MUH PROPERTY VALUE (Score:2)
A non-issue? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Two-Sided (Score:4, Insightful)
"Some people get so rich they lose all respect for humanity. That's how rich I want to be." -- Rita Rudner
Apparently the bar for this level of wealth has been dropping significantly over the years.
Re:Two-Sided (Score:4, Insightful)
Apparently, some people think that the first step towards being filthy rich is to treat people like garbage.
Re: (Score:2)
In Florida people just live in gated communities. This guy likely lives in an entirely gated home. I doubt he'd even see them other than when he drives by.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
If someone parked a fruit truck in front of my house and started waving down passing cars to try and sell them fruit. I would be annoyed and call a cop.
There are two farmers markets within 3 miles of my house one is sponsored by various community organizations and is free to the vendors.
Re: (Score:3)
Re:Two-Sided (Score:5, Insightful)
The problem is not two sided. We as a culture, would much rather ignore the problems of the poor than face them.
This argument "I don't want to see poor people" are Coded in a lot of different ways.
"Worried about property values", "Maintain community values", "Allow our children to safely play outside"...
But it really comes down to the fact that we don't want to see poor people. Because they can be scary because there isn't much for them to lose. And we may emotionally feel bad for them, and we don't want to feel bad.
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:3)
Possible isn't probable.
Re: (Score:3)
"I hate sounding preachy, but you shouldn't use wealth to give yourself some moral superiority."
Most "opportunity" is available and achievable at the cost of some sacrifice. What we have are few people who are willing to live elsewhere (where they might find a job) or even more basic -- holding off marriage and parenthood until one can afford a family.
If you want to dramatically reduce a chance to live in poverty, don't do drugs, dont drink, work hard in school and DO NOT HAVE KIDS without a spouse and unt