Poverty is Real, And it is Not OK

[Ridgerunner]

Have you read the entire article? It would only take about 5 minutes. It is basically Donella Meadows recalling her memories about India when she read a letter from Vicky Robin. But I guess you do not like Donella Meadows’ ideas though.

I neither like nor dislike her ideas as expressed, since she expressed none. What she did express were simply her own feelngs about material circumstances more straitened than those to which she, herself, is accustomed. This tells us nothing about whether these people value their own lives or not.

 

[ribozyme]

I neither like nor dislike her ideas as expressed, since she expressed none. What she did express were simply her own feelngs about material circumstances more straitened than those to which she, herself, is accustomed. This tells us nothing about whether these people value their own lives or not.

Here is some of her writings…

pcdf.org/meadows/default.htm

She obviously has left-wing political views although she dislike the Democratic Party and focuses more as an environmentalist (and remember she co-authored The Limits to Growth.)

 

[yellowbicycle]

I think some goals of fighting abortion and poverty reduction are mutally exclusive. Of course, I want emphasis on the latter.

Really? In what way?

 

[aspawloski4th]

Fighting poverty will be an endless fight. Remember Jesus said there will ALWAYS be poor amungst us.

 

[Angels_Unaware]

State CAREFULLY what specific claims that you want backed up. You thought I stated that there was a linear relationship? What claims I have made that you want backed up?

Here are several empirical claims I have made:

Happiness is determined by genetics (after a certain point of wealth is reached) and there is a natural set point

Religion can increase happiness

A good marital relationship can increase happiness

Financial security reduces stress

People in Denmark and Sweden are happy because of their lower income inequality and high absolute standard of living

There is diminishing marginal utility on wealth

This is an online forum and I do not feel obligated to rigorously support some of my claims (especially the claims 2,3,4, and 6 as it seems intuitive; I’ll leave the burden of proof for those who oppose those claims). However, I feel that claims 1 and 5 may need to support and I will assume the burden of proof on those claims.

Your premise is that people who live in poverty should never have been born because their lives are “garbage”, and instead of preventing abortion in poor countries, we should re-distribute wealth. Is that correct, or not?

How do the above empirical findings lend any support whatsoever to that premise?

 

[cantueso]

Most of the poor in the U.S. would be considered upper middle class in most other countries, even today. A poor family in the U.S. with a $10,000 p.a. income, a house or apartment with indoor plumbing, heat, A/C, telephone, TV, stereo, etc. would be well-off in China and India, and rich in most of Africa…

There is something terrible and new about the big-city poor.In the shanty towns people live on garbage, and their houses are made of garbage, and they cannot get out.

In order to live in a city you need cash, that is, employment. In the past the poor could try and live off the country side hunting or even stealing.

 

[bilop]

Most of the poor in the U.S. would be considered upper middle class in most other countries, even today. A poor family in the U.S. with a $10,000 p.a. income, a house or apartment with indoor plumbing, heat, A/C, telephone, TV, stereo, etc. would be well-off in China and India, and rich in most of Africa…

There is something terrible and new about the big-city poor.In the shanty towns people live on garbage, and their houses are made of garbage, and they cannot get out.

In order to live in a city you need cash, that is, employment. In the past the poor could try and live off the country side hunting or even stealing.

The only thing new is the moral degradation caused by loss of faith in God, the destruction of the family and a hedonistic/materialist culture that says all that matters is having stuff and having sex.

The urban poor have it a lot easier than traditional peasants. Try working the fields 12 hours a day, making all your own tools and clothes, with no charity available (b/c everyone else is a subsistence farmer like you) and no contact with the world outside your village. No entertainment besides what you create yourself. That’s how 95% of the world lived before 1900.

God Bless

 

[cantueso]

There is something terrible and new about the big-city poor.In the shanty towns people live on garbage, and their houses are made of garbage, and they cannot get out.

In order to live in a city you need cash, that is, employment. In the past the poor could try and live off the country side hunting or even stealing.

The only thing new is the moral degradation caused by loss of faith in God, the destruction of the family and a hedonistic/materialist culture that says all that matters is having stuff and having sex.

The urban poor have it a lot easier than traditional peasants. Try working the fields 12 hours a day, making all your own tools and clothes, with no charity available (b/c everyone else is a subsistence farmer like you) and no contact with the world outside your village. No entertainment besides what you create yourself. That’s how 95% of the world lived before 1900.

God Bless

Where do you get your idea of the urban poor from?
In the past the poor lived among the poor. It was a normal condition as you can see in the Quixote and even better in Lazarillo. It was everybody’s plight.

And no, they did not live on garbage in the past. When Spain was absolutely poor after the civil war, they ate grass and cats, and many lived in caves.

.

 

[Ridgerunner]

Doubtless others can argue otherwise, but I have read, from a number of sources, that the urban poor in India are largely newcomers from the country who, amazingly, actually came to the cities to achieve economic improvement. Evidently, there is almost no access to cash in the countryside (some exceptions of interest) Some fellow whose only asset is a foot-operated sewing machine comes to, e.g., Calcutta and lives on the sidewalk in order to participate in the cash economy.

One of my great grandfathers came from Italy in the 19th century. He could not speak English and could obtain only work that, literally, blacks (then on the bottom of the native-born opportunity list) would not take. He worked in the deep coal mines that existed then in Kansas. The work was beyond horrible and the pay was ridiculous. Yet, in the course of a few years of subsisting on nothing but polenta (his clothing needs were modest because the mines were so hot and humid you had to strip naked to go down into them and survive) he saved enough cash money to make a down payment on a farm. He was a capable farmer and made it work. His son worked hard and bought a farm, lost it in the depression, cut wood for a living, miraculously saved enough cash to make a down payment on another farm and ultimately managed to send both of his daughters to college. He, himself, never finished the third grade.

I’m not entirely persuaded the commentator in the original post really understood what she was seeing.

Re the exception to “no cash in the countryside” abovementioned. I met a young man from Mumbai who was in this country as a trainee for a computer company which has operations in India. He told me the “rising tide” in Mumbai has affected the countryside very favorably. Farmers can come into Mumbai and hawk their product for cash. With that cash they can buy land, tools, sink wells, etc. People like the young man make what would be very low salaries here but are princely there. Such people as himself, he said, spend cash readily to buy the products and services of those who are less fortunate than they are. Perhaps he was too optimistic, and doubtless one would have to understand the context, but “everybody makes money in Mumbai” he said.

 

[turtle18]

I think poverty reduction is much more important than talking about abortion.

Good night. It is not a contest about which issue is “more” important. Just because there are poor people in the world does not mean that we shouldn’t preach the truth about abortion.

The way you phrase your statement, you are judging all those who do the work of God and somehow imply that your views, your beliefs are more important than others.

Is there some reason why you can’t talk about how important it is to work to reduce poverty without bringing up the issue of abortion?

By phrasing the issue in the way you have, you are condemning people who work to reduce abortion, work to save lives. It is utter & complete nonsense–there is no reason for it.

Go ahead and work to reduce poverty but don’t be so darn critical of how the rest of us respond to God’s call.

 

[Holly3278]

While poverty is an important problem to tackle, abortion is a more important problem to tackle.

 

[cantueso]

Doubtless others can argue otherwise, but I have read, from a number of sources, that the urban poor in India are largely newcomers from the country who, amazingly,

.

I am new to this forum and I don’t know how to see whether you meant your message as an answer to mine.

My point, not clearly stated, was that in the pre-industrial past there was wealth for just a few and the rest were poor.

Now untold millions are rich or very rich. Poverty in the West has lost its economic justification.

I don’t know about India etc. The novelty is that now people cannot build their own houses anymore; they would not know how to, and the law would probably not let them.

 

[Ridgerunner]

I am new to this forum and I don’t know how to see whether you meant your message as an answer to mine.

My point, not clearly stated, was that in the pre-industrial past there was wealth for just a few and the rest were poor.

Now untold millions are rich or very rich. Poverty in the West has lost its economic justification.

I don’t know about India etc. The novelty is that now people cannot build their own houses anymore; they would not know how to, and the law would probably not let them.

I didn’t. I was simply asserting something I understand to be true, that, in India at least, most of the urban poor are newcomers to the city, who came, paradoxically, to earn cash money. It is the Indian version of taking the first step on the ladder of what they hope will be a better life. In some places there, if what I understand about Mumbai to be true, one’s chances are fairly good. In looking at the urban poor in the third world and even in the first, we are sometimes looking at a snapshot in time of people whose lives will actually improve, and whose present condition is part of the process. But because the bottom rung in our society is so much higher, we do not see that they have a ladder too.

 

[KingAlfred]

“Poverty is Real, And it is Not OK”

No…it isn’t, but remember: Jesus said the poor will always be with us. We must try our best to help them, but poverty will always exist. It’s a sad fact of life. Ideologies, such as Marxism, which claim to be able to eliminate poverty are wrong-headed, and in fact, *dangerous. * If poverty could be permanently eradicated, Jesus would have said as much. He didn’t.