The mathematical improbability of pulling yourself up by your bootstraps

Cover photo by Karolina Grabowska

If you’ve never experienced being poor, let me give you a really important tip:

Your advice is rarely useful when it comes to financial success.

Odds are you’ve never had to decide which bills to pay, skip a meal, or decide if you can afford your medication this month. If you need new shoes, you go buy a pair.

In fact, your friend (who always seems to be struggling financially) needs to go shoe shopping. Perfect! You finally have an excuse to pick up those new boots you’ve had your eyes on.

As you’re looking at the shoes, you see your friend go to the clearance section and pick out a pair of shoes that are pretty bland; plain, black, and cheap looking.

“Don’t get those”, you say. “Get these over here! They’re better quality, they’ll last you a lot longer, and you’ll end up spending less money since you won’t have to replace these in 6 months”.

Have you heard this one before? If not, then you definitely need to.

You see, the friend is buying the cheap pair of shoes because they only have $30 to spend this month, and they need the black shoes for work.

You can’t understand that, so you just assume your friend is being dumb and wasting their money.

“You’ll never get ahead if you keep wasting your money like that.”

And that’s where you lose a friend.

The whole “saving money in the long run” thing is great, but in order to do that you have to HAVE money in the first place.

In a more realistic situation, my GF’s car broke down again.

She got it for free, but we’ve sunk enough money into it to probably buy a better one at this point.

Of course, folks keep telling her “Hey, just buy this car, it’s only X and it’ll be cheaper in the long run!”

She doesn’t have the money to buy car “X”. Hell, she doesn’t have the money for the repairs, either; I’ve been helping her out with that, loaning her the money with the hopes that eventually she’ll be able to pay me back.

That hasn’t stopped folks from insulting her, of course. Folks that are supposedly her friends.

Folks that have money.

We’re lucky; I have money in savings, have good credit, and have managed to secure things well enough for us that we can keep her car working.

I can’t just drop the money on a new car, though, no matter how much better it would be financially. I’ve got my own financial responsibilities; medical bills, a mortgage, and more.

If I end up in the ER again, I will probably end up depleting my savings.

Again, I’m the lucky one here.

The difference between me and my GF’s friends is that I grew up poor. I know what it’s like to struggle financially, and haven’t forgotten it.

You may say “but you spend money on Y and Z, just don’t spend money on those!”

While sure, someone could cut back to absolutely the bare minimum needed to technically “survive”, there is more to surviving than food & shelter.

Stress and unhappiness can have an impact that most don’t understand.. Especially if you suffer from significant mental health problems as a default state.

Emotional stability is a critical part of stability in life, and all the money in the world won’t save you from severe depression, anxiety, stress, and more.

For me, stress can be a serious issue. As I get older, things like my heart just aren’t working quite as well as they used to.

That’s why I do things like target shooting: It’s a great source of stress relief for me. Once a month I hit the range to clear my mind and get my body to relax for a bit.

Of course, again.. I’m lucky I can afford to do that now.

About 12 years ago I couldn’t, and was so stressed I was losing my hair in large patches.

Have I made my point yet to you?

Pulling yourself up by your bootstraps sounds great, but I’d love for you to show the work. Here’s a little word problem for you:

How does someone who makes $100 a week stay on top of their bills, gas, and other necessities also buy a new car when the existing one is in the shop with a nearly $800 bill for the tow & repairs?

Hint: They don’t, because they are fucked without a support network.

There are no bootstraps here to pull, but the ratted, tattered old shoes that they keep replacing because they can’t afford the “good” shoes.