On Poverty: Why It Persists And What We Should Do

It is not that the issue of poverty is too big or too complex to solve. We know how to solve it. But we are in catch 22 position because the key to solve that problem is in the hands of people who do not really care about it, or do not care enough to solve it, or do not want to solve it. In relation to the problems and solutions of poverty, people are of three kinds: Ones who need helps, ones who can help, and one who cannot help. To put it in a different way; there are three groups of people: the poor, the good, and the rich. Poor people need help. Of course, they should help themselves first, but they still need to be assisted. People are poor not because they are bad. People become poor for many reasons; some of them are institutional, thus out of their controls, and some are just a result of bad luck or misfortune. Similarly, people are rich not because they are good. People become wealthy for several reasons; not all of them are of merit or virtue, some are because of institutional advantage or favour they have unfairly over others, and some are just out of good luck. Having hearts or big hearts, good people want to help those poor people but do not have capacity or resources. So they cannot help, or cannot help enough. Rich people have resources and capacity to help poor people but lack will to help, or are not interested in helping. So they do not help either. I am not saying that all rich people are not helping; there are in deed many rich people who truly care for poor people and are thus helping them. But the number of those rich people are insufficient to address or solve the poverty crisis.

No matter what they say, many people who are in a position to help the poor do not really care about them. They think about themselves, and care only about themselves, and are interested in their interests and pleasure. Look at the strikingly huge amount of money those people are spending on unnecessary things or activities. They do not need to give up all their money in order to help the poor. But a certain portions of their wasteful expenditure should be used to help the poor. If they do not, or do not want to, they must be forced to do so. Here comes a big question: is it their responsibility? I am sure it is, and will talk about it more detail later in another note. In order to solve poverty crisis, most resources should be in the hands of good people, or people with big hearts. Good people should be rich and powerful, so that they can help the unfortunate.

Myo

31 May 2019, Friday, 2:00 am