www.alphadictionary.com

Makes sense.
I got the sense of the poor, forever in poverty's grip,
being pushed forever downward, stepped on, kicked
under the rug, taxed unmercifully. Picture
Louis XVI and the French Revolt. That was my idea.
And then the huge drill into rock........etc.

Today TGIF: The grind's over for the week ! ! ! !
The
Grind
Is
Finished

Abject (hopeless)
grinding poverty. Good place for the word. This
fits in well. Miserable, humiliating, wretched.

The poor folks in Haiti come to mind here.

Does anyone out there know how poverty came to be referred to as "grinding?"

Ask, and you shall receive (sometimes!):

grinding
pp. adj. from grind, O.E. Meaning “oppressive” is from 1580s. The verbal noun is from mid-14c.

So it appears that it has been around for a while. Kinda like me ...

How do you get by making personal comments like that,
without getting your hands slapped?

How do you get by making personal comments like that,
without getting your hands slapped?

If you mean the last line, above the signature, a personal remark about myself, it's because the first part of the post gave an answer to the original question, and provided a link (Etymology Online) to the reference, not just an inane comment.

To see how I added the link to the quote box, click the "quote" button in the upper right corner of the post to examine the code.

In the "Post a reply" window, you can click the BBCode link on the lower left of the window under Options. This opens a new window explaining BBCode.