[quote=Jannah]
You're exactly right it's extremely hard to break free from poverty. It's why almost my entire family is poor. I have a couple wealthy aunts, but that's only because they married into wealthy families. It has turned them into complete arrogant snobs though. Anyway, I don't feel a need to pour out my entire life story here so I will just say it makes me feel a bit better when somebody finally shows sympathy. It's way too often poor people are blamed for their situation. In my case that couldn't be further from the truth since I was born into a poor family. With that said, I suppose it can give you a bit of an idea of why I generally distrust most wealthy people, CEO's especially. Small business owners I have less issue with, however. I know most small business owners are just trying to survive too, but due to the nature of capitalism it's rare for small businesses to survive without being forced to expand. Of course that expansion happens at the expense of others.
[/quote]

Yeah, that's usually the sad truth of the matter. Somebody's suddenly rocketed to a position of obscene wealth and suddenly, they act like dicks. Justin Bieber, for instance, is the perfect case study of that. He probably wasn't a bad kid before he was suddenly treated like royalty and had more money than he could ever spend. I guess when you have so much wealth that something as basic as affording your utility bills and groceries every month kind of makes it all seem trivial and you kind of get disconnected with the fact that most people aren't lucky enough to have enough money to live comfortably, let alone buy expensive toys and monster houses. And it's especially true in your case, how do you break out of poverty when you're born into it? It's families like yours that deserve a break more than anyone, but people tend to forget that. It's just damn regrettable that the people who are most able to do something about the situation you and countless millions of others face is that when you're so high up, you kind of lose sight of what's down below. It's what makes people like Bill Gates and Warren Buffet so remarkable; they may be unfathomably rich, but they contribute so much back to charity that it's literally painful to try to wrap your head around the amount of money that's being funneled back into communities and towards good causes. 

As for the small business thing, it's part of the reason I usually try to buy some mom and pop stores when possible, plus you usually get better service there. It's not much, but a few regular customers can make or break a business.