Reaction Paper About Poverty Simulation

After completing the poverty simulation, I learned that it is very hard to live to on a paycheck to paycheck scenario. I also learned that anything can happen at any given moment that can cause you to miss hours at work or use more money than budgeted. In this they threw out many different curve balls that caused you to make tough decisions that people are faced with which made it all the more real. I also learned a few statistics that may be outdated but looking at the numbers put the situation of poverty into a whole new perspective.
I was surprised by everything this simulator had to offer. What I mean by that is I took it a few times to see if it would give me the same scenarios, but it didn’t. This surprised me because this just goes to show not everyone in life has the same struggles. Another thing that interested me were the statistics after every decision made. The one that stood out the most to me was that 15 percent of Americans had trouble getting food at some point in 2012. This was surprising because this just gives me a different way of viewing things. Instead of knowing that people suffer from poverty, I can see that 15% of the population in 2012 struggled to eat while many others didn’t.
I feel that these are reasons because if the cost of college were cheaper people wouldn’t be scared to invest in their education. In most cases a better education leads to higher wages, and higher wages generally means that people can afford to live comfortably. It is safe to say that I now have a better understanding of people in my community because I am from Virginia Beach and I used to spend time in Norfolk so I have seen tons of homeless people and I even know of some people who suffer from poverty. I never truly understood how bad this whole thing was until