Question
Which is harder, being poor in America or being middle class in the developing world?
Answer
Definitely being poor in America. Especially poor and black. Definitions/metrics may vary but the broad conclusion is the same no matter how you slice and dice.
It depends partly on which corner of the developing world you are talking about (South America, Africa, India, China, SE Asia), but from my experience of India and what I've read of the other big regions (see 'Young World Rising' by Rob Salkowitz for instance), being middle class in the developing world (at least the safe, crime/violence/war-free parts) is easily way better than being poor in the US.
Two things confuse people and lead them to doubt this pretty obvious conclusion: they confuse "stuff" for "good life," (Americans typically have more "stuff" ergo, they must have a better life) and they think America is the "land of opportunity" for anyone who can get there (ergo, anyone who is already there has a head start, and no excuses for failing... mistaking access to opportunity for capacity to pursue it). In fact, many middle class members of the developing world mistakenly define "making it" as "getting to America and having lots of stuff." They badly misunderstand where their wealth actually lies, and how much of it they already own.
First, the "stuff equals good life" error of confusing correlation for causation. In most of the developing world, owning a car (or motorcycle/scooter) is a symbol of arrival into the middle or upper-middle class. In America, you can own a car and still have a train-wreck of an impoverished life that imprisons you completely. Ditto TV, refrigerator etc. They simply aren't the signifiers of middle class status, well-being and quality of life in the US that they are in the developing world. When I lived in India, I used to be completely taken in by this, because I didn't think about it deeply enough. I genuinely mistook "stuff" for "middle class status" and used to get impatient with anyone who even mentioned poverty in America. A conversation in a middle class living room in India among people who've never been to America might go as follows: "what do you mean poverty in America? How can someone be poor when they have a car and refrigerator? And look at how fat they are, they obviously have enough food... they ought to get off their butts and work; there's opportunities all around them. Our maid who lives in a slum, now THAT"S real poverty."
Second: access to opportunity versus capacity to pursue it. The middle class in the developing world, at least until the recession, saw migrating to the US as such a tough, aspirational goal, they couldn't really imagine that life could be tough here. The typical middle-class Indian mindset pre 2000, for instance was "if only I could get there with an F1 scholarship or an H1B job, I'll work like crazy and make it" (now it is more likely to be "startup in Bangalore after a couple of years learning the trade at Infosys."). They confuse access to the opportunities in the US for the social capital wealth that enables you to pursue them. And they get off the boat armed with a lot of this social capital: cheap and good basic K-12 and undergrad education at 1/100 the American price, a safe and secure childhood, generations-old family cultures emphasizing education/good work ethic, family social net, and strong and well-placed social networks (a typical middle class Indian or Chinese can usually find a useful connection in any corner of the globe a few hops away, willing to make introductions for instance; the poor in America truly cannot even reach out of their blocks in some cases, truly a "ghetto" condition in the fullest sense of the word). It is these advantages that middle class migrants "cash in" on to "make it" in America. So despite what they think, it is actually easier to make it in America if you start by being born somewhere else, than in some parts of America itself. Weird but true. The route from the middle-class neighborhoods of India to million-dollar homes in Silicon Valley is actually far shorter than the route to the same destination starting in a bad, drug-riddled inner-city block in Detroit.
So no-brainer here. I'd definitely choose middle class in developing world over poverty here. Anybody who has seen both sides of the comparison would do the same I suspect.
It depends partly on which corner of the developing world you are talking about (South America, Africa, India, China, SE Asia), but from my experience of India and what I've read of the other big regions (see 'Young World Rising' by Rob Salkowitz for instance), being middle class in the developing world (at least the safe, crime/violence/war-free parts) is easily way better than being poor in the US.
Two things confuse people and lead them to doubt this pretty obvious conclusion: they confuse "stuff" for "good life," (Americans typically have more "stuff" ergo, they must have a better life) and they think America is the "land of opportunity" for anyone who can get there (ergo, anyone who is already there has a head start, and no excuses for failing... mistaking access to opportunity for capacity to pursue it). In fact, many middle class members of the developing world mistakenly define "making it" as "getting to America and having lots of stuff." They badly misunderstand where their wealth actually lies, and how much of it they already own.
First, the "stuff equals good life" error of confusing correlation for causation. In most of the developing world, owning a car (or motorcycle/scooter) is a symbol of arrival into the middle or upper-middle class. In America, you can own a car and still have a train-wreck of an impoverished life that imprisons you completely. Ditto TV, refrigerator etc. They simply aren't the signifiers of middle class status, well-being and quality of life in the US that they are in the developing world. When I lived in India, I used to be completely taken in by this, because I didn't think about it deeply enough. I genuinely mistook "stuff" for "middle class status" and used to get impatient with anyone who even mentioned poverty in America. A conversation in a middle class living room in India among people who've never been to America might go as follows: "what do you mean poverty in America? How can someone be poor when they have a car and refrigerator? And look at how fat they are, they obviously have enough food... they ought to get off their butts and work; there's opportunities all around them. Our maid who lives in a slum, now THAT"S real poverty."
Second: access to opportunity versus capacity to pursue it. The middle class in the developing world, at least until the recession, saw migrating to the US as such a tough, aspirational goal, they couldn't really imagine that life could be tough here. The typical middle-class Indian mindset pre 2000, for instance was "if only I could get there with an F1 scholarship or an H1B job, I'll work like crazy and make it" (now it is more likely to be "startup in Bangalore after a couple of years learning the trade at Infosys."). They confuse access to the opportunities in the US for the social capital wealth that enables you to pursue them. And they get off the boat armed with a lot of this social capital: cheap and good basic K-12 and undergrad education at 1/100 the American price, a safe and secure childhood, generations-old family cultures emphasizing education/good work ethic, family social net, and strong and well-placed social networks (a typical middle class Indian or Chinese can usually find a useful connection in any corner of the globe a few hops away, willing to make introductions for instance; the poor in America truly cannot even reach out of their blocks in some cases, truly a "ghetto" condition in the fullest sense of the word). It is these advantages that middle class migrants "cash in" on to "make it" in America. So despite what they think, it is actually easier to make it in America if you start by being born somewhere else, than in some parts of America itself. Weird but true. The route from the middle-class neighborhoods of India to million-dollar homes in Silicon Valley is actually far shorter than the route to the same destination starting in a bad, drug-riddled inner-city block in Detroit.
So no-brainer here. I'd definitely choose middle class in developing world over poverty here. Anybody who has seen both sides of the comparison would do the same I suspect.