11 Family Traditions That Keep People In Poverty Without Their Parents Meaning To
Poverty is more nuanced than people believe.
Ground Picture | Shutterstock While family rituals around the holidays and traditions that bring families together can be beneficial for bonding, closeness, and cultivating connections, according to a study from the Journal of the Association for Consumer Research, other daily rituals that take root in a family's routine can be detrimental. Whether it's refusing to talk about money or always focusing on someone's physical appearance, these are the family traditions that keep people in poverty without their parents meaning to.
Even if they seem harmless and unsuspecting, the picture of poverty and financial well-being is more nuanced than people realize. Of course, small spending habits and "treats" aren't the root cause of poverty — it's an institutional problem, where nobody living in poverty is directly to blame.
Here are 11 family traditions that keep people in poverty without their parents meaning to
1. Not talking about money
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According to a study published in the Journal of Behavioral Decision Making, kids as young as five years old can start to develop attitudes toward spending and saving money. So, building financial literacy isn't just an adult educational practice — it's directly tied to the conversations and lessons parents or guardians are teaching their young kids.
Even if it's just having healthy conversations about money with a partner while they're in the same room, these traditions are powerful. However, when parents make it a practice to avoid these conversations and demonize talking about money around their kids, those are the family traditions that keep people in poverty without their parents meaning to.
2. Over-prioritizing appearance
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While the majority of people believe that appearance-based changes and body dissatisfaction are entirely surface-level issues with no real "cost," like Harvard Social and Behavioral Sciences professor Bryn Austin suggests, the truth is that they cost the U.S. over $300 billion annually. Of course, these seem like disconnected topics on a surface level, but there is so much nuance.
According to a study from Social Science Quarterly, people can use their physical attractiveness for upward social mobility and, of course, the more money they have, the more freedom they have to change and alter their attractiveness in line with advantageous societal beauty standards.
However, for low-income households, whose financial predicaments can often make falling in line with societal beauty expectations much harder from a young age, having a parent or a family places an unrealistic emphasis on the tradition of your appearance can make life tough. If you're always operating from a place of low self-esteem, where you feel like you need to change, extra money may be fueling those insecurities as an adult.
3. Rewarding everything with a little 'treat'
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This kind of "deservingness" is often how people justify overspending. Of course, it's not the little investments and treats that are keeping people stuck in a systemic kind of poverty, but it could be one of the family traditions that urges people to spend, even when they don't have the money to do so.
Poverty is an institutional problem, rooted in wages, demographic injustices, race and ethnicity, locational shortcomings, district funding, and a million other nuanced issues that have yet to be addressed. It's a helpless and hopeless predicament for many, so it's no surprise that people use tiny treats and surprises to cope — even if it's just a piece of candy from the corner store.
We do deserve these kinds of things, as humans, and because of our adversities. But when it becomes an excuse or justification for big overspending habits that leave people in a more tumultuous financial situation at the end of every month or year, it's a toxic family tradition.
4. Overworking for praise
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Many families place an emphasis on the importance of hard work, which is important in many cases, but when kids always see their parents overworking themselves in a job and being constantly stressed out, that could be toxic for their adult lives. Even if it doesn't seem like a "tradition," watching parents come home late or overwork themselves to a stressed out baseline is a ritual and family tradition in its own right.
General health, work stress, upward mobility, and socioeconomic status are all inherently linked. If someone is overworking themselves to stay afloat financially, they're taking on mental and physical health dilemmas that make it more difficult for them to work. Alongside that, their entire life becomes work and money stress, a kind of tradition that urges children to follow suit, even if it's entirely subconscious.
5. Equating rest to laziness
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If your parents always made it a tradition to avoid naps after a hard day at school or even stayed up late working to "prepare" for the next day, chances are demonizing rest is one of the family traditions that's keeping you stuck in low-income situations, even though your parents didn't mean it.
Most people agree that money really can buy happiness in the right conditions. If you're always tired and feel chronically overworked, money buys you the freedom to truly rest and avoid the everyday hassles others deal with. However, people stuck in poverty may fall into the belief that they're working hard for praise and mobility, even if it's an act of self-sabotage.
6. Prioritizing college degrees at all costs
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If someone is under the impression that going to college or paying for a graduate degree is the key to success and making a financially strong life for themselves, they could find themselves in even more trouble than they started with.
That's already clear for many Gen Z people, who were promised careers after going to college, but only ended up with hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of compounding student loan debt. Of course, in some countries, communities, and families, increasing education opportunities and increasing educational attainment can lower poverty levels, but it can also encourage people into a situation with more debt if they're not careful.
7. Avoiding credit cards and banks
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For many low-income parents living in poverty, they may demonize and shame using credit cards and financial support systems entirely, aware of how overusing them or leaning on them for comfort destroys their own financial futures. However, credit-building is incredibly important for everyone, especially young adults coming out of poverty.
That's why avoiding credit cards and being mistrusting of banks are some of the family traditions that keep people in poverty without their parents meaning to. They don't have that little glimmer of hope in investing, finding support, or building credit for the future, so they're stuck in a stagnant financial situation.
8. Refusing support
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Whether it's turning down governmental support options or leaning on people for resources, refusing to ask for help could be one of the misguided family traditions that keeps people stuck in poverty without their parents meaning to. Of course, people living in poverty are ironically the most giving to their friends and neighbors, but when it comes to accepting help, shame could lie at the heart of their dismissals.
Asking for help isn't just a financial strength, it builds closer bonds and boosts self-esteem, both of which are inadvertently related to wealth and money. Be intentional about advocating for yourself and accepting health — it could be the ticket to a more financially comfortable position.
9. Leaning heavily on the struggle
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Dealing with adversity and trekking through hardship does tend to build resilience in character, but if you're leaning too heavily on struggle as a defining characteristic of your life or a segment of your identity, that could be sabotaging you.
Especially considering that a great deal of our identity's foundation is crafted in adolescence, according to a study from Child Development Perspectives, when many of us are still living at home with our parents, it's not surprising that the struggle of our parents plays a role in our adulthood, even without our parents meaning for it to.
10. Using faith to reject abundance
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The "humility" of poverty or the rejection of "wanting" in the context of organized religion may keep people living in poverty. Low-income people tend to have stronger relationships with faith and religion than their wealthy counterparts, which is nuanced in so many ways.
And if they've been shamed into wanting more financially, they may remain stuck in low-income situations. They cling to struggle, define themselves by religion, and find ways to demonize their own internal wanting for comfort in this life.
11. Buying things in celebration
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If your family bought luxuries or big investments to celebrate things, chances are that's one of the family traditions that keeps you stuck in poverty today, even if it was entirely unintentional. For example, your parents get a raise at work or a holiday bonus and buy a new car. The money they received feels like a treat, and they want to celebrate it, even if they will struggle to afford their bills at the end of the month.
Of course, we're all deserving of treats, luxuries, and comfort in our lives, but when it comes at the expense of long-term financial stability, it can be disillusioning and toxic.
Zayda Slabbekoorn is a senior editorial strategist with a bachelor's degree in social relations & policy and gender studies who focuses on psychology, relationships, self-help, and human interest stories.
