Finished Mo 1/2/17
I heard an interview with the author on Fresh Air last summer and immediately put the book on hold. I was 8th on the list, and I didn't get the book until late December. I picked it up (randomly checked the computer) when I attended the Contemporary Book Club meeting last Wednesday evening.
This is the best non-fiction book that I've read in ages. It should be required reading for everyone, especially those in government and even education.
These kinds of social problems can be shaped by public policy, but they are not really political issues. 'Job creation' can't help if people cannot understand the concept of what exactly a job entails. Vance provides an example of a tile store that he worked at when he was a young man. The owner offered a nineteen year old man a $13.00 an hour job, and since his wife was pregnant he also gave her some office work. Neither one of them showed up on time, and when they did they took excessive unscheduled breaks. When they were finally let go, they never accepted the fact that it was their own fault that they were fired. This couple posted on social media that it was Obama's fault that they lost their jobs; "Thank-you, Obamacare"!
These people feel completely adrift in their own lives. Because they feel that they are not in control, they are convinced that they cannot make poor decisions because nothing that they do will have any impact whatsoever. I think that this is the heart of the book, and Vance basically shows how this cracked manner of viewing life played out in his own family.
Although his mother was the smartest person he ever encountered, she was cross addicted to drugs and alcohol and made abysmal 'romantic' decisions. J.D. and his older sister never had a stable homelife. Mawmaw (M'am-me) and PawPaw were the emotional cornerstones of their lives- his mother's parents. It was just luck that he lived with his grandmother from his sophomore year until he graduated high school. The stability that he found in this home allowed him to concentrate on what was important to his life.
I thought it was odd, but not out of the realm of possibility, that he chose a stint in the US Marines instead of college right out of high school. I guess his unusual? streak of patriotism accounted for this life changing decision. I just wish that instead of being drafted into the military, young Americans had an opportunity to ''serve' in other fields. I think that the world would be a much better and safer place if we deployed teachers, architects, social workers, or medical personnel all over the world instead of soldiers.
Another slight bone of contention is that he seems to feel that 'Day Loan' outfits might provide positive help to the poor. He sights an example of when he was working for a congressmen and forgot to pickup his paycheck on a Friday evening. He says that had he been able to get a loan on this check, he could have avoided a $50 overdraft on an outstanding bill. I agree that 'Day Loan' would have been a reasonable alternative, but why should they be allowed to charge ridiculously high interest rates. Surely the banking industry is making quite enough profit, and they should be forced to cap interest rates wherever and whenever a loan is offered. Although conservatives never address it, there is even an admonition about outrageous interest in the bible.
I loved the book, and I'm going to use my $25 gift card from Barnes and Noble that Jamie and Melissa gave me for Xmas to buy the book. Yesterday I went into Barnes and Noble, and the place was packed. The checkout line stretched south from the entrance all the way to the end of the store. I left immediately. Why were all of those clowns in a bookstore? Trump won.
The book's page in wikipedia-
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hillbilly_Elegy
Amazon-
https://www.amazon.com/Hillbilly-Elegy-Memoir-Family-Culture/dp/0062300547
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