{"id":91,"date":"2024-03-18T12:00:00","date_gmt":"2024-03-18T12:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/moneywithkatie.com\/does-focusing-on-systemic-issues-create-a-victim-mentality\/"},"modified":"2025-09-03T18:51:42","modified_gmt":"2025-09-03T18:51:42","slug":"does-focusing-on-systemic-issues-create-a-victim-mentality","status":"publish","type":"essays","link":"https:\/\/moneywithkatie.com\/essays\/does-focusing-on-systemic-issues-create-a-victim-mentality\/","title":{"rendered":"Does Focusing on Systemic Issues Create a \u201cVictim Mentality\u201d?"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

I just turned in the manuscript for my first book. And while no part of writing 100,000 words is easy and breezy, there was one persistently itchy thread that wove itself into the pages of my growing Google Doc, relentlessly stalking me through the paragraphs like the deranged ghost of Clippy.<\/p>\n

Call it \u201cthe Lean In<\/em> effect,\u201d or, perhaps more simply, \u201ctalking out of both sides of your mouth.\u201d Regardless of the label, acknowledging systemic limitations then proceeding to recommend individual solutions<\/em> feels a little like taking swimming advice from someone who just<\/em> finished telling you about the treacherousness of the open ocean.<\/p>\n

This duality is literally structured into the book, as each chapter contains two parts: First, we ground ourselves in the reality of the situation. Then, we talk about what you can do to navigate<\/em> said situation. The latter isn\u2019t meant to be a solution<\/em> for the former\u2014just an antidote for some of the symptoms. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\n \u201c<\/span>Individual agency within a collective movement is crucial to systemic change.\u201d<\/span>\n <\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/figure>\n
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I try to be forthcoming about this intellectual discomfort from the jump, admitting that I struggle with the interplay between making a living offering individual solutions while being painfully aware of all the ways they fall short. While I still don\u2019t feel like I\u2019ve totally resolved this cognitive dissonance, I saw a video<\/span><\/a> from Caroline Burke last week that helped me get a little closer.<\/p>\n

\u201cDoes acknowledging systemic issues mean you have a victim mindset?\u201d she asks, somewhat rhetorically, in response to a commenter who asked her a question I\u2019ve wondered, too: Individual agency within a collective movement is crucial to systemic change. How do you find a solution without making it a personal issue?<\/p>\n

These things exist\u2014almost by definition\u2014in a paradoxical relationship with one another. As individuals, we\u2019re inextricably bound by systems, but systems are constructed of and by individuals. So which comes first? The chicken, or the well-versed-in-policy-reform egg?<\/p>\n

Last week, we did a Rich Girl Roundup<\/span><\/a> about housing costs\u2014does the \u201c30% rule\u201d still make sense,<\/em> we asked, in the <\/em>most unaffordable housing market<\/em><\/span><\/a> in 40 years?<\/em> We reviewed the benchmark\u2019s history (public housing policy<\/span><\/a> in the 1960s) and how it\u2019s changed (ballooned from 25% to 30%<\/span><\/a>), and we enumerated all the different budgetary configurations one could deploy to fit the housing puzzle piece neatly in frame without disturbing the rest of the picture.<\/p>\n

We didn\u2019t<\/em> examine the confluence of reasons that we find ourselves in this \u201cmost expensive\u201d housing market, or how the median home used to cost 3x median wages, not nearly six<\/span><\/a>. We didn\u2019t talk about the investors and private equity firms gobbling up millions<\/span><\/a> of single-family homes, or the zoning board meetings where your local community members are voting to block the development of new multifamily housing to artificially restrain supply and shield their property\u2019s value from downward pressure. We didn\u2019t address the decade of underbuilding<\/span><\/a> that followed the collapse of the Wall Street-induced<\/span><\/a> housing bubble in the mid-aughts, or how those bearing the highest levels of responsibility quietly retired with multi-seven figure exit packages<\/span><\/a>. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\n \u201c<\/span>You can confine your scope of concern to individual advice, but you will never be operating outside the bounds of objective reality.\u201d<\/span>\n <\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/figure>\n
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Nope. We didn\u2019t address any of that. We just said, \u201cShoot for 28% of your net income and hope for the best, toots!\u201d<\/p>\n

This is the difference between individual advice and \u201csystems thinking\u201d (as Caroline calls it) in personal finance and economics. You can confine your scope of concern to individual advice (or, at least, try to), but you will never be operating outside the bounds of objective reality. The vote at the zoning meeting affects you whether you\u2019re aware of it or not, because we #LiveInASociety.<\/p>\n

Caroline points out the way awareness of these issues increases<\/em> personal autonomy, not the opposite. That is, if you understand why<\/em> your landlord is permitted to raise your rent by 15% each year and why<\/em> there\u2019s a shortage of supply in your area, you\u2019re less likely to view your housing strain as reflective of some personal shortcoming. You\u2019re also more likely to recognize that there are probably others\u2014maybe even those in your same building or neighborhood<\/em>\u2014who are experiencing the same thing.<\/p>\n

When individual autonomy meets systems thinking, you are empowered to create collective action.<\/strong><\/p>\n

When tenants in a working class<\/span><\/a> Minneapolis apartment complex were faced with negligent ownership and rising rents in 2019, they started talking to one another about it. They realized that while they were no match for their multimillionaire landlord individually, together, they could financially overpower him. When a single tenant doesn\u2019t pay rent, it\u2019s the tenant\u2019s problem\u2014they get evicted. But when an entire building<\/em> refuses to pay, it\u2019s the landlord\u2019s problem.<\/p>\n

The renters\u2014who called themselves United Renters for Justice\u2014alleged in a class action lawsuit that their landlord had denied timely and reasonable repairs and was hiking rents. (Terrifyingly, the owner of the building had actually been disallowed from renting to others for past offenses.) <\/p>\n

Until the matter was settled, they agreed not to break solidarity: They weren\u2019t going to pay rent. This was a common tactic<\/span><\/a> in the early 20th century and during the Great Depression to protest price gouging and rent hikes, but you rarely hear about collective bargaining from the renter class today. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\n \u201c<\/span>Collective action inspired by an awareness of the systems you\u2019re navigating reclaims and rebalances power. It is the opposite of a victim mentality.\u201d<\/span>\n <\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/figure>\n
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Had each tenant privately handled the matter, they likely would\u2019ve been forced to spend the majority of their incomes on rising rents, gotten evicted, or taken on the personal and financial expense of voluntarily moving so someone else could move in and be exploited in their place. <\/p>\n

Instead, they won a landmark settlement: $13 million was distributed to more than 4,400 tenants who had lived in the buildings since 2012. They ended up using some of their funds to purchase the buildings from their landlord, and they turned it into a housing cooperative.<\/p>\n

Collective action inspired by an awareness of the systems you\u2019re navigating reclaims and rebalances power<\/strong>. It is the opposite<\/em> of a victim mentality. It uses all the tools available to you\u2014community, the legal system, democracy, individual willpower\u2014rather than just the blunt object of personal responsibility and \u201ctrying harder.\u201d<\/p>\n

Who is more empowered to keep their housing costs below 30%? An individual contending with the so-called free market, or tenants in a collectively owned housing cooperative who can exercise more power and control over their outcomes? (Never mind that any market rife with both local and federal government intervention and institutional-scale investors competing with regular people can hardly be considered \u201cfree.\u201d) <\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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>
\n \u201c<\/span>Collective action enables greater individual agency, and vice versa.\u201d<\/span>\n <\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/figure>\n
\n

Collective action enables greater individual agency, and vice versa. In some ways, my life (and aspirations as a finance writer) was easier before I knew about things like private equity and wage stagnation and the porousness of \u201ctrickle down\u201d economics. <\/p>\n

The \u201c50\/30\/20 model\u201d allowed me to tie a much neater bow around best practices than the admission that actually, every other high-income nation on earth subsidizes childcare, so the fact that you have to spend 20% of your take-home pay on it is <\/em>highly abnormal. <\/em><\/p>\n

These realities are frustrating and inconvenient for those who proffer personal financial advice, but that doesn\u2019t make them any less real\u2014and it\u2019s only in acknowledging them fully that we can move forward with true autonomy.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I just turned in the manuscript for my first book. And while no part of writing 100,000 words is easy and breezy, there was one persistently itchy thread that wove itself into the pages of my growing Google Doc, relentlessly stalking me through the paragraphs like the deranged ghost of Clippy. 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