I believe this

[inyati13]

I was born and raised in KY. I left in 1980 and I lived in Colorado, Wyoming and Montana. I have been in 44 of the 50 states including Alaska.

I enjoy the unique qualities of Kentucky but there is a reason for this:
http://money.msn.com/investing/americas ... est-states
ND, SD, Neb, Minn and Montana are the happiest states.
W. Va, KY, Miss, Alabama, and Ohio are the most miserable.

Personally, I would rate Colorado above Montana. I think I enjoy the people and lifestyle of Colorado better than anywhere I have been.

I have empathy for the poor quality of life of my fellow Kentuckians. I am conservative but how do you ask people to work hard and do for themself when they spend more money getting back and forth to work than they make. People seem broken down by life. I was just talking to a guy at one of the restaurants in Mt Olivet which has a population of 284 and it is the county seat of Robertson County. He was telling me the guy who put the roof on my barn when I was renovating it, fell from a roof and ripped his arm to the bone on a piece of tin as he went over the edge. He cannot do the work that he made a meager living at and is in arears on his water bill. He was a hard worker but without an education, high demand skills or crafts, he is spiraling deeper into poverty which was about where he was when he worked. I feel sorry for him because he was a good human being.

This country is headed toward a reconstruction phase! It only survives now because we can still borrow to float our economy. There are thousands of people in this state who live on the edge.

 

[pdfangus]

and it has gotten much worse in the last few years and seems to be heading in the wrong direction still......

six or eight years ago my life was rolling along fair....paying the bills ...had a little money in the bank...looking forward to retirement....

today....no money in the bank....struggling to meet the bills and losing ground....can not see retirement from here....prices of everything sprialing upward....with no upward mobility for me...at 65 there is no change of career in the future either....

 

[Caustic Burno]

and it has gotten much worse in the last few years and seems to be heading in the wrong direction still......

six or eight years ago my life was rolling along fair....paying the bills ...had a little money in the bank...looking forward to retirement....

today....no money in the bank....struggling to meet the bills and losing ground....can not see retirement from here....prices of everything sprialing upward....with no upward mobility for me...at 65 there is no change of career in the future either....

It is the same here if people can't get in the oil industry work 75 miles south they are starving to death.
The government has all but shut down the lumber industry unless you are a big time operator.
They have regulated the working man out along with all the small mills.
We have lost a quarter of our congregation in the last year, the younger people had to move toward Houston to find work
for their families.

 

[Bigfoot]

The economic plight in Ky used to be strictly and eastern Ky thing. It is slowly starting to take us all over. I retire in 6 years, soon to be 5 (yea I'm counting them down). I hope things don't get hay wire that I can't.

 

[branguscowgirl]

I agree Inyati. It is VERY scary here in CA as well! My heart breaks for so many people that ARE working hard, and just can't make it!

 

[kerley]

In the 80' we had Reagan, Johnny Cash and Bob Hope....Now we have Obama, No Cash and no Hope.

 

[trappersteve]

I was born and raised in the mountains of VA and would not trade this place for a mansion in California. A lot of people talk about us hillbillies as idiots and moonshiners. Im very happy where im at and wouldn't trade my little farm for anywhere .

 

[Nesikep]

Up here it's no different unless you're in the big city, or you have a government or union job... Around here *everything* seems to run on grants... our town GOT A GRANT TO HIRE SOMEONE TO APPLY FOR GRANTS!!!.
Then a guy comes along and starts a business on his own, he's making ends meet (or nearly), and someone else gets a grant to do the same thing.. Well now neither of them can make a buck, the person who got the grant put someone else out of business.

In this area, the government had grants available to ranchers to improve the ranch's irrigation system, usually into center pivots. The grant covered half the expenses, so the big ranches bought a D8 cat, did the work themselves, billing $120/hr, and got half the center pivot paid for. Then they turn around and sell the ranch for 3 times the price and pocket the grant money in the form of the increased value of the ranch, while pricing the ranch out of the range of any private individual. We have some monstrous ranches around here... The Gang ranch, Chezacut Ranch, Douglas Lake ranch, and others are in the 10,000-50,000 deeded acre range, while they have 250,000 acre grazing liscenses... They get bought up by WALMART and other offshore interests... No person will ever own a ranch that can make money again.

Every younger guy I know has to go to Alberta in the oilfields to make money, where they do little more but learn how to spend large amounts of it... few of them have the brains to save it

 

[Bigfoot]

I was born and raised in the mountains of VA and would not trade this place for a mansion in California. A lot of people talk about us hillbillies as idiots and moonshiners. Im very happy where im at and wouldn't trade my little farm for anywhere .

I agree this is home, and I wouldn't won't to be any place else. I do miss trickle down economics though. More trickled thru here back then.

 

[jdman1952]

Well according to our plant manager the cost of living is not rising. That shows how well informed he is. The troubles are only beginning for this country. It used to be the harder you worked the more you progressed, but now it is just the opposite.

 

[pdfangus]

The problem is the federal government and increasingly the state government has got its nose in everything and offers money and then you are their prisoner.

why should the federal government have money to offer grants for all this stuff? and the taxpayer be broke....

 

[Nesikep]

Yup, and whenever the project is grant-funded, it'll be a half-arsed effort at the best of times. I think matching grants are a better idea, where the person, or organization that has a project must raise at least half the funds... that'll make the projects more serious.

Around here we have the "Lillooet invasive species society", which is completely grant-run, employs some post graduate who doesn't have a chance in heck to be employed by anybody else, they run a weekly 4x5" ad in the local paper about some random invasive species, but you think anyone would actually just pull a weed?.. There was this one weed they said needed to be injected with a herbicide... with a needle!.. Seriously? you mean taking a pickaxe to it and cutting it's roots wouldn't do? It must not be complicated enough for a university graduate!.. Then we wonder why our countries are swimming in debt!

Just this evening there's a guy from the US in our town that's going to talk about reviving local economies... we're going to go and see if he's got anything to say that could have a chance of working.

The next joke is "Shop local"... Diesel in this town is $1.57/L.. or $6/USG... 50 miles away it's 20 cents less. Our local cardlock is more expensive than the pumps.. What's up with that? A roll of roofing tarpaper in town is $44, in the next city it's $24... I can accept paying slightly more in a small town, but when it has reliably ripped me off on everything I've wanted to buy, I'm going to stop even thinking about buying locally, and just make a trip to someplace where I get a reasonable price

 

[TexasBred]

The problem is the federal government and increasingly the state government has got its nose in everything and offers money and then you are their prisoner.

why should the federal government have money to offer grants for all this stuff? and the taxpayer be broke....

Because they took it from you. Now they try to make you think they are doing you a favor by giving you some of it back IF you'll pay for half of it.

 

[branguscowgirl]

In the 80' we had Reagan, Johnny Cash and Bob Hope....Now we have Obama, No Cash and no Hope.

:clap: So true! :frowns:

 

[plumber_greg]

What if we just all helped our fellow man"? Ron, he helped you. gs

 

[Nesikep]

That's all fine and dandy, if the whole place isn't in the same mess

 

[Jogeephus]

The problem is the federal government and increasingly the state government has got its nose in everything and offers money and then you are their prisoner.

why should the federal government have money to offer grants for all this stuff? and the taxpayer be broke....

Because they took it from you. Now they try to make you think they are doing you a favor by giving you some of it back IF you'll pay for half of it.

Amen!!!

 

[cow pollinater]

The problem is the federal government and increasingly the state government has got its nose in everything and offers money and then you are their prisoner.

why should the federal government have money to offer grants for all this stuff? and the taxpayer be broke....

Because they took it from you. Now they try to make you think they are doing you a favor by giving you some of it back IF you'll pay for half of it.

Amen!!!

How do you go about getting some back? I can't even get that and they still treat me like a prisoner. Out here when you ask for something they offer you a government program(paid for by you because you're the only one left that works) that is supposed to teach you how operate without whatever it is you needed in the first place...Nevermind that the cost of getting your business to the point to where you no longer need what you originally needed will put you out of business.

 

[cross_7]

I had to bite my tongue
I have a cousin that is signing up for cost share for fencing and brush control
Welfare IMO !

 

[Ryder]

The problem is the federal government and increasingly the state government has got its nose in everything and offers money and then you are their prisoner.

why should the federal government have money to offer grants for all this stuff? and the taxpayer be broke....

Because they took it from you. Now they try to make you think they are doing you a favor by giving you some of it back IF you'll pay for half of it.

They took some of it from you. But borrowed most of it.
That's called "stimulus". :bang: