A heck of a lot more people think they know something about the causes, cures and experiences of being poor than actually do. If you haven't been poor yourself, or at least lived and worked with the poor extensively, believe me, you have no clue.

I used to get so angry in law school, listening to silver-spoon frat boys and always-sheltered suburban girls pontificate on poverty and often condemn the poor, while having known only security and comfort themselves, with a secure social safety net of at least modestly wealthy families, good connections and privilege, and utterly oblivious to the fact that they had no experience of the deprivation, humiliation and fear that real poverty entails.

To me, perhaps the worst part of being poor is the continuous, soul-eating fear and worry. If anything, anything at all, goes wrong, a relatively minor illness, a broken down car, or any other unexpected emergency, you're toast, because you have no margin for error. Being poor means facing potential disaster every day.

Suffice it to say, the working poor have it very tough in this country, and it is extremely hard for them to work themselves up a socio-economic ladder when they keep getting knocked off. The young and healthy can withstand and maybe eventually overcome such setbacks, but add some years, a disability, a mental illness or other chronic health problem, a child, or any sort of criminal record, and their odds of ever making it into our shrinking middle class diminish rapidly. They'll likely stay poor for the remainder of their lives, no matter what they do.

For every person that claws their way up into the middle class, another one, or more, gets knocked down into the ranks of the poor, and many of them are darned surprised to find themselves there, let me tell you. It's a real eye opener. Divorce is a leading cause of poverty for middle-aged, middle class women, and medical expenses bankrupt and impoverish many formerly secure families including those with health insurance. We also seem to have forgotten that, before Medicare, MOST seniors were living in poverty. The poor are very much like us. It is psychologically comforting, but misleading, to think otherwise.