Yes, the labor theory of value is garbage economics, but I’m not sure how it fits into this particular discussion.

Basic money management is not at all complicated. By the time someone completes fourth grade in a typical U.S. elementary school, she has mastered the necessary math for the subject. No, that person may not be able to explain exactly how municipal bonds work or how to compute an amortization table, but she will be able to lay out and follow a budget, with pencil and paper if necessary. “This month I expect to bring home this amount; food, housing, utilities, and transportation will cost so much; and that will leave this many dollars in expendable income.” Addition and subtraction is as complex as any of that gets.

For people who want to learn more, Suze Orman, Clark Howard, Dave Ramsey, The Motley Fool, and Personal Finance Stack Exchange are just a few of many who produce affordable, accessible resources. We all have our respective circles of friends and acquaintances to learn from or at least to ask for pointers.

This is not a high bar. Now, an entirely different question is whether people have learned to moderate their behavior around these basics. “I have so much money and want to buy this; can I afford it?” Prioritizing needs versus wants, setting goals, making a plan are also not heavyweight intellectual endeavors but do require a bit of discipline.

Of course people do fall on hard times through no fault of their own. The disabled and mentally ill are examples or people who fall into bad health, either themselves or their children. (The American system of healthcare and particularly health insurance are terribly broken, but outside the scope of this thread.) Yes, these terrible situations do happen, but they are exceptions. Bad times, not necessarily this severe, will hit us all, so the smart course of action is to save up now for when the rainy day comes later.

Living in a home that costs so much relative to one’s income that it leaves little in the way of disposable income or even to cover all necessities is known as house-poor. As with any other good, when it comes to housing, we all have to ask ourselves whether we can afford it. Yes, moving is stressful, uses mental energy, and costs money. I’m an instrument-rated pilot. An important part of the training is learning to guard against hazardous attitudes, one of which is resignation. Giving up and thinking ‘I guess I can’t do anything about it’ is dangerous in that it can kill you quickly in an airplane or in slow motion from the stress and anguish of living house-poor. They can do something about it, and their lives will be far better on the other side. Rent an apartment at first to allow cushion for saving money. I live in north Alabama, an area whose TV portrayals bigoted people sneer at. The median house price here is under $150k, and believe it or not we do have indoor plumbing!

We’re on the same page about the bum deal many have been sold on college too. Just like everyone in college is not pre-med or pre-law material, not everyone in high school is college material. They are still human beings and therefore worthy of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. The education establishment has done them a grave disservice by making vocational training out to be a last resort for the scum of the earth. People working the skilled trades make good money — in part because they are not competing with people who can walk in off the street and do the same job. Elsewhere you mentioned Home Ec being ground down to nothing, and it seems to be part of the same trend as with vocational training. No one should ever be forced into these programs because of someone’s backward ideas about certain people’s alleged place in society — that would be evil and wrong — but denying someone who’s mechanically inclined or who wants to be a homemaker the opportunity to be their very best at these worthy, honorable, necessary positions – again for the sake of mere political axe grinding — is likewise evil and wrong.