How can you tell if Americans are "poor"?

I think you have overstated this more than a trifle. As for the passport thing, it's possible to travel within the United States to experience vastly different cultures. As for voting, are you aware of who won the popular vote in the last two presidential elections?

Re comment about VANCE having married an Indian woman: first, she is American. Not Indian. Not only are you racialising her, but in the USA people of South Asian descent generally are NOT discriminated against the way they are in the UK. Nor are they seen as lower on the social hierarchy ladder as they are in the UK.
partly because the numbers are so much lower, partly because there is NOT the colonial history, and partly because they generally are in white collar professions

Umm..no, actually. The astonishing ignorance of many (most) Americans-wretched school system—about the rest of the world is shocking. Most do not have passports and would prefer to visit Epcot than leave USA. Most do not read newspapers and get any news from echo chambers like FOX. Have you ever read a local paper in the US? Any foreign news is in a short paragraph on page 26. Which
Complete absence of critical sensibilities. They are gullible and vote against their own interests: Trump, e.g.; they do not have a clue about how a welfare state would benefit them, and distrust it. Qanon is far more widespread than you can imagine. And the puritanical Christianity pervasive reinforces these beliefs- remember, it was settled by British puritan fanatics who were too extreme for Britain!

I’m in the UK and can sympathise, we’ve been on the end of some pretty power hungry committees/parish councils who run the best kept village competitions, and this is only for a month or so in the Summer, so can’t imagine it year round !
Think of Midsummer murder type villages (without the dead bodies obvs) 🤩

I live in a community with an HOA, but ours is pretty reasonable, all things considered. The difficulty comes when power hungry people get on the boards of HOAs and try to run them as little fiefdoms. There are quite a few YouTube videos about overzealous HOAs. In my state, we do have some protections against overreaching.

yes. seems immoral that poorer communities might not have access to a basic supermarket selling fruit and veg. no wonder obesity is at such an extreme level when all you have ready access to is fast food.

I love watching TikTok videos about HOAs. Their reach and power is boggling to me. If I ever find myself living in the US I will sure as heck avoid being under control of one of these associations. It would be enough to turn me into a full blown Libertarian.

Not only that, but food deserts

I remember reading an interesting article about town planning in wealthy v poor neighbourhoods in the US. Fewer trees are planted in poorer neighbourhoods making them noticeably hotter in the summer months. The lack of trees also meant the air was more polluted.

Exactly.

My newly acquired family were American middle class, but their children who didn't have degrees have struggled to remain middle class.

There is a massive difference between the coding of wealth and poverty in television and movies and how people actually live.

just because television shows tend to use certain cues to indicate poverty does not mean those cues are accurate. They are stereotypes that film well, nothing more. That is why you see them over and over again.

It's interesting. When I went to the USA, at 24 I flew into JFK on Christmas Eve in a big blizzard. My transport "home" was several hours late arriving and I literally had no means of paying for overnight accommodation. Fortunately, we got back to xDH's home in time for the full Xmas Eve festivities. I was so out of it so quickly, I think they thought I was stupid for several days. Once we put that misapprehension to rest, they were brilliantly supportive.

Catfish has lots of good examples.
Teeth.
Very obese. But not always. But fresh food is so expensive.

I’m American. On TV, this is how you know a character is supposed to be poor:

Woman is outside the house with curlers in her hair.

Show is set in the present, but characters stand around outside smoking.

Characters are wearing faded t-shirts.

Character says “ain’t,” but is not from the South.

More later, have to go.

I’m American and when I was younger, I was amazed in the opposite direction. I remember watching the first Harry Potter movie and seeing how the Dursleys’ house was right up against their neighbors’, which isn’t something people of their social class would have in the US.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_and_territories_by_poverty_rate

Hillbilly Elegy is a very good read regardless. Ghost written, IDK (suspect so, by JH Moerhinger perhaps, whose own memoir (The Tender Bar) is a lovely tribute to the kindness of the older men his father used to hang out with in the pub who looked out for his son after his dad died prematurely.

In the US, there is a stark gap between the people who saved towards tuition fees for university and those who didn't. JD Vance's family didn't and probably could not have afforded to do so. But he joined the Marine Corps at 18 for 4 years, and learned a lot about credit and finance (there's an anecdote about him buying his first car and his mentor telling him not to take the car dealer's commercial finance deal because it would cost so much less via the credit union he belonged to). The really important point about JD Vance's narrative is that his parents' demographic stopped bothering to parent at adolescence. The UK, in large part, is there now.

JDV makes it clear that he joined the Marines for four years to fund univeristy fees. I suspect I will read in the next 50 pages that he worked his socks off to achieve entry to Yale Law School. I don't expect to read a great deal about Peter Thiel's $100K investment in him as a political candidate.

Yes, of course we can tell. Don’t think we’re very good at discerning class amongst people from the UK either. I was shocked that farmers are somehow considered posh (info coming from my husband). It’s really a different world.

I live in Philadelphia. I would class us as poor but no longer living quite under poverty line. Our house is a twin and cost $86,000. The neighbourhood has shootings regularly and a crack house on the corner, but it also has nice neighbours too. We are poor because we live paycheck to pay check and usually run out of money by middle of each month after all the bills come out. We have one car, which was second hand and is 13 years old. Our kids qualify for free school lunches and scholarships based on income.

a lot of Americans can borrow vast amounts on credit cards and mortgages etc. I know people who earn less than us who live in nicer houses. Who have brand new fancy furniture because it is on credit zero down. Whose kids wear designer clothes.

*’The writers/producers of My Name is Earl also had another comedy show called Raising Hope where all the main characters were poor.

Multi Generational living, teen parenthood, insecure part time employment.

The main character, Jimmy, who's parents had him when they were very young had a fling with a woman who turned out to be a serial killer.

He raised their child who was born in prison while living with his parents and great grandmother who they all cared for. It's a great show and is probably still around on one of the streaming platforms.*

I flip flop on if they are poor or lower income.

Virgina had the same job as a maid for most of Jimmy’s childhood. Burt had a lawn care business, Virginia was the main carer for Maw-maw, who owned the house and suffered dementia so she wouldn’t have been able to live alone. The house was large enough for all of them to live in and have their own rooms. If Maw Maw died, they would have likely inherited the house. Jimmy worked for his dad and at a grocery store but married Sabrina who comes from a rich family and he and Hope move into the house she inherited from her grandmother and him becoming a writer/illustrator for children’s book if I’m recalling it correctly.

I started reading Hillbilly Elegy this morning, because I am interested in the person who might inherit the Presidency. I lived in the US (Tri-State area) from 1980-85, and have been back more recently for visits, still have friends there.

JD Vance is fairly typical of those descended from Scots Irish immigrants who settled in Appalachia. He understands how and why that cohort have transferred their political allegiances from Democrat to Republican. Interestingly, I saw the shift starting to take place among some groups of acquaintances in the small towns of NJ/NY/CT. People without college degrees or trade skills that could become small businesses were already struggling for employment. There was a tendency to serve in the military for the college education opportunities that followed. Globalisation of the economy has done nothing for this cohort.

My successful, college-educated, liberal-thinking professional friends and acquaintances are aghast at the polarisation, but like Hilary Rodham Clinton, view redneck attitudes as deplorable.

Unless Joe Biden agrees to stand down gracefully and the Democrats rustle up someone with broader appeal, I think the Republicans have the election in a bag.

Thank you, I found this on Disney+ and binged it yesterday! Loving it.

On a side note I never intended tis thread to be "poor or US bashing" - just wanted an insight into perspectives seen on TV

@flavourableit's not your fault at all, that's just the way these threads invariably go.

Some of the TV references on this thread are laughable if people genuinely think they accurately represent particular social classes. It would be a bit like someone suggesting that "Keeping Up Appearances" is a faithful portrayal of a social climbing middle class wannabe and her working class relatives. 😂 Obviously, sitcoms exaggerate, simplify, and reduce complex situations for comic effect. I would take most of the TV recommendations with a grain of salt (as we say in the US).