Posted on 09/26/2012 10:02:15 AM PDT by rightwingintelligentsia
On a recent evening, a hip-looking young woman was sorting through a stack of crates outside a fruit and vegetable store here in the working-class neighborhood of Vallecas as it shut down for the night.
At first glance, she looked as if she might be a store employee. But no. The young woman was looking through the day’s trash for her next meal. Already, she had found a dozen aging potatoes she deemed edible and loaded them onto a luggage cart parked nearby.
“When you don’t have enough money,” she said, declining to give her name, “this is what there is.”
The woman, 33, said that she had once worked at the post office but that her unemployment benefits had run out and she was living now on 400 euros a month, about $520. She was squatting with some friends in a building that still had water and electricity, while collecting “a little of everything” from the garbage after stores closed and the streets were dark and quiet.
Such survival tactics are becoming increasingly commonplace here, with an unemployment rate over 50 percent among young people and more and more households having adults without jobs. So pervasive is the problem of scavenging that one Spanish city has resorted to installing locks on supermarket trash bins as a public health precaution.
(Excerpt) Read more at cnbc.com ...
If marriage had been listed in the “to-do” list that we are discussing, my opinion would be different, but the suggestion on that list sounded like selling oneself to me.
er,...sounded to me like selling oneself.
and when the EBT’s stop working
Yes it would still be immoral, I don’t think it is even questionable
per capita donations to charity are higher in spain than other european countries, but nowhere near the US
http://www.ief.es/documentos/recursos/publicaciones/revistas/hac_pub/165_charitable.pdf
He was also taken to parties and clubs, where he met hundreds of other young men, similarly situated. He gave me the impression it was quite common.
I hope these charities manage to take care of people pawing through garbage for food. Personally, it breaks my heart.
Although it was 40 years ago, this fellow probably died at a young age (gays die very early compared to straights). If he had been born in the 1960s, he would have died of AIDs in the early 80s. I lost several friends during that era.
For thousands of years, fathers have made "being able to support her" a precondition for a young man being allowed to court their daughters. It's only the last few decades that women have thought it "liberating" to be able to screw whatever charming handsome unemployed loser came along.
I never said any woman should farm herself out to the highest bidder. I'm saying that there are likely to be guys out there who are (A) employed, and (B) easy enough to get along with that she would enjoy living with him.
You keep refusing to accept that the current situation in Spain (and other places) is deteriorating to two choices (1) find something you can do that will put food in your belly, or (2) die. I'm not attempting to force any particular choice on any particular person. I'm simply undertaking the unpopular task of pointing out that the choices are becoming increasingly limited.
Meanwhile, people are going into hysterics over my pointing out the current situation.
I never mentioned prostitution. If she can paint his living room and refinish his floors in exchange for food and shelter, then fine.
Ok, so she continues to scrounge the garbage bins for edible food. And as the economy sours further, she gets to compete with guys willing to beat her senseless if that's what it takes to get enough food.
and that makes it moral how?
I guess at that point you think its moral to pimp out the wife and kids?
Because Johns never ever hurt the hookers, right?
Hope all you want. When unemployment reaches 25%, there are too many people needing help, and not enough charity.
The choices then become:
(1) Do something for which somebody will provide you with money or support.
(2) Die.
(3) Try to take others' stuff by force (which will eventually turn into (2) in the US and many other places).
I see lots of hysterical upset over reality being disclosed, very little in the way of viable proposed alternatives. The situation WILL be coming to the US real soon, unless we dismantle much of the federal government. Go ahead and shut your eyes until the truck hits.
IF THE ALTERNATIVE WAS DEATH and I was either dead or unable to enable their survival, my wish would be that they found some reasonably good man who would be able and willing to help them survive.
Keep in mind the scenario. I'm not advocating somebody sleep with a guy in order to get some bucks to buy a fancy car. I'm talking about doing what's needed to survive.
Thanks!
It won’t be “a guy”. If its that bad no one person is going to be able to help.
“A guy” would be a husband.
We’re talking turning tricks for an MRE with strangers.
On the Kartographers threads a guy named Selco lived in a Bosnian city under siege, there were women turning tricks for a canned good.
It was my understanding that Spain’s (and Ireland’s) economic troubles were not the cause of socialist policies–they were not created from government debt for social welfare or military programs–both countries ran budget surpluses and maintained very very low debt to GDP ratios. Instead, their problems came from speculation in the PRIVATE sector, specifically property speculation...although borrowed euros at very low interest for massive public works also appeared to have played a significant part as you suggest.
Government monetary policy has a lot to do with it, the private sector doesn’t create inflation etc. Government usually passes laws that create bubbles and malinvestments (see solar and wind etc)
These are socialist welfare states. No country on Earth has a real free market any more.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.