Noelle Stout: Poor Living Wage
on Wednesday, July 26, 2023Meaning of Noelle Stout Money Quote: saying The poor suffer from the commodification of debt products and pay ever more for being poor. Noelle Stout said:
“Being poor is not simply a matter of lacking opportunities to convert one’s labor into a wage — or a living wage, for that matter — but rather of becoming indebted and, through the commodification of these debts, paying an ever-higher price for being poor” — Noelle Stout
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In this quote, Noelle Stout is discussing the high costs and financial burdens that poverty can place on people. She argues that being poor is not just about lacking opportunities to earn enough money through work or a living wage. Rather, she says that poverty often results in people becoming indebted or taking on debt, and then having to pay increasingly high costs and interest on that debt over time due to their financial circumstances.
Stout refers to this as the “commodification of debts”, meaning that debts owed by poor people essentially become commodified financial products that are traded and can accumulate more and more costs. So her point is that poverty is not just about low income, but also about the cycle of debt and high costs that the poor often face, which in a sense makes them “pay an ever-higher price for being poor” through the interest and fees attached to their debts over time.