I think appropriate Education is the key I think our schools not are a joke Me and a friend were saying. . . everyone needs a hustle SOMETHING . .a skill they can use as a back up I fix computers. . . no matter that else I may do I could always hustle up some money fixing the neighborhood computers Same with a Mechanic . . electrician . . .plumber . . .etc I think a dual education is necessary esp in impoverished areas Vocational and College bound . . NOT TWO TRACKS but Simultaneously People need to be at a higher skill level Rocket River that is part 1
Agreed with Rocket River. Our public school system is a joke. The best university system in the world has to spend time on redemial classes because students come in unprepared.
Get rid of the current party running Texas state government, and we would take a giant leap forward here, at least. Talk about jokes... they sit in leadership positions in Austin. Keep D&D Civil.
While education is a good thing in general, what good is an education if there are not enough jobs available? The best way to address poverty is to promote the economy by lowering taxes and cost of doing business. In addition to that, the government needs to provide incentives to hiring people within the country. Education is an important facet to this equation, but people realize that education is not everything.
Invent nanotechnology that can transform our waste products into resources (think "Mr. Fusion" from Back to the Future, but on a more comprehensive scale). Until then there will always be "Haves" and "Have Nots".
Flood cheap, addicting, and deadly drugs into our inner streets. Scratch that one. The CIA already tried the idea.
not true an educated populace CREATES JOBS in that new ideas are being brought forth that creates new industries that is primarily why America has lead the world . . . look at what we have invented and marketed from telephones to electricity to computers new industries have been created and totally replaced the old NOW part two is the steady regulation of the power at the top We CANNOT have monopolies and people squashing ideas just to maintain their position . . . We cannot have water powered cars squashed because oil barons and Ford don't want them out [it is an example. . . i'm have no idea if something liek that exists] Rocket River
Nobody is saying education is everything. It's just the #1 thing. Don't take me wrong, but the dominance of foreigners in our universities is scary. And Mr. Clutch nailed the reason dead on! Too many children in this country have no chance at prosperity because they are undereducated. This problem, as much as anything, will undermine America's future prosperity. As a nation, we are mostly in denial right now, which is sad. Tax policy can definitely promote the economy in the short/mid term. But when it comes to addressing long term poverty, the weak primary & secondary educational system in our country must be upgraded severely.
My opinion is going to be a little dark. Personally, I do not think there is anything wrong with the system now and i don't believe in free handouts. Globally: When an species is faced with a challange, it must do one of the three things: 1) Adapt 2) Move or 3) die. If ethiopians can't produce food, then they need to do one of these three things. Granted a billion ethiopians can't just get up and move, then they need to either adapt or die. They can adapt by lowing their childbirth significantly, but that won't happen. So they are just left with ... well, dying. US: Im sure there can be tweaks to help those who REALLY want to be helped, but lets face it, those who really are up for the challange, they will find a way. Most of us want the american dream off a 40 hour work week. Sorry, but it doesn't work that way. We live in an era where everyone has a chance to be sucessful. This is proven over and over again. A multibillionare like Donald Trump can lose everything, but gain it all back ... repeating this cycle again and again. A poor person can win 10 million dollars and be completely broke in a matter of years. Face it, some of us were meant to be on the bottom of the totem pole. Its all about the survival of the fittest.
Several problems with your post. 1) The world isn't like nature anymore. It isnt simply a matter for competition of resources. The creation of government, global economies, etc.. all complicate the equation and make it much harder to simply reduce everything to numbers and formulas. 2) Specifcally in the US, its not so easy to move up. I know your 6th grade history class probably espoused America as the nation of social mobility, but wake up and look around. We still have structural barriers that prevent true upward mobility. If I go to school in urban Kansas City, (which has some of the worst in the country), I have no shot of being anything. Hell I'll be lucky if I come out knowing some algebra after high school. I hope your suggestion isnt that because of my unfortunate circumstances I should die. I'm hard working but because of the corruption in the school district, I came out with no education. This problem is a problem all over the country and one that can't simply be answered with "oh go get a job." 3) So your solution is for Ethiopians to just fall over and die? They have no shot at getting into the global economy because their government is corrupt and they dont have any resources that can significantly boost their social position. Last I checked, many of these problems were caused by the same rich Western European population that you cite as a model for society. To simply reduce people to numbers that can die off at will is something that would result in massive war and resource conflicts that would draw in other groups. You'd have riots all over the world if you just simply cut off all aid. Global stability as a whole falls apart if you reduce a group of people to nothing because they were unlucky enough to be born into a specific place. A really lovely way to promote peace isn't it... As economist John Maynard Keynes once said "in the long run, we're all dead." 4) Your types had your day in the 1920s and 30s when classical economics ruled the day. Well guess what, the extreme fluctuations created by a society without any safety nets creates the rapid yet unequal growth of the 1920s and the rapid collapse of the great depression. Stable growth is simply impossible without government safety nets. In terms of international growth, such a system would create entire areas of death and destruction while you party it up in your priveleged world. Personally, I prefer our system now to your worldview.
generally i agree. we need education. but obviously as DC shows just spending more money isn't the key. so what it iss? i dont know. but i'd imagine it has a lot to do with changing people's perception. their belief that theres no way out of the ghetto and such. most of us buy into the anyone can pull themselves up from the bootstraps theory because most of us are fairly intelligent and at least have the capacity and mindset that we can do fairly decent in life. that probably has a lot to do with the people we've grown up with and the people we've seen succeed. but many times in the poverty stricken inner city that isn't the case. so how do we change this? i dont know.
Call me an insensitive b****, but I agree with Space Ghost. If you don't like your situation, you can change it. It's not going to be easy, but where there's a will, there's a way. I think it is none of our concern what happens in the rest of the world. If you want to go over to Ethiopia and adopt a child who would otherwise die of starvation, that's your choice, but I'm not going to. And no, I don't want to give 37 cents a day to adopt one either. Poverty is self perpetuating. A poor man marries a poor woman. They can't afford any kind of education or birth control, so they just start making babies. But they are so poor, the first one dies, the second one lives, and so does the third, but now they need more children to grow up and help with living expenses. so they have fourth, but it dies, and the fifth lives, the sixth dies, and they stop with seven children, 4 of them survive to adulthood. Now the children are grown up and can look after the parents, but none of them have an education because they all helped out around the house. But now they need little hands around the house, so one of the poor boys goes and marries one of the poor girls from down the street and the cycle continues. If you want to stop poverty, education is where it's at. Education and birth control will do wonders.
If you're born poor, no matter how hard you work, chances are good that you're going to stay poor. The whole mythology of the "American Dream" is just that - a myth, and a dream. It's been fed to us for far too long without being questioned.There has been an erroneous belief in the U.S. for a very long time that your income is proportional to how much effort and time you put into working. Bull****. That's wrong, and what's worse is the implication that, if you're poor, it's because you're either lazy or stupid and likely some combination of both. If you believe that, you're a ****ing moron (and there are a lot of ****ing morons in the poor community because the standards of success in this country have convinced them that they are lazy and stupid). Lazy and stupid people can be quite "successful" if they're born with the right advantages, and intelligent hard-working people can break their backs for years to get some relatively minor gain, and that might just be a lucky break. People who have never experienced true poverty have no idea in hell how debilitating it can be. It's not just an impediment to material success, but can be such a hard and ugly life that it extracts a psychological toll as well. The poor sap who you think is a lazy dirtbag has had to work twice as hard and live through five times as much **** as you have just to get half of what you were born with. So, keep telling yourself whatever it is you need to tell yourself to feel good, but don't pretend like you're an authority on the subject. If you haven't been there, you don't know.
As I said in the Why are Countries Poor Thread, is that there are many reasons why people are poor and I would think its a mistake to pin poverty on any one cause or have any one solution. Education - obviously provides enormous benefits but that doesn't change the fact that there are many people who are well educated who are still poor. Desire - Willingness to work hard and pull yourself by the bootstraps helps also but that doesn't change the fact that there are many who work very hard and are very ambitious but still are poor too. Like it or not luck plays a far greater role in success or poverty than either of those factors. The luck of where you were born and to whom. The luck of being at the right place and the right time. The luck of knowing the right person. You can be the hardest working smartest person in the Congo and still be poor and you can be a complete lazy @ss moron scion of the Getty family and not only be rich to begin with but have many opportunities to make more money with minimal or no effort on your own part. The problem is how can a society and government even out luck and until we can deal with that there is always going to be a certain amount of poverty in any society. I personally think that to eliminate poverty, in the sense of that everyone has enough resources to at least be fed, clothed, housed and have health care and education, that its going to take a major change in the mindset of most humans. We're going to have to both radically redistribute capital while at the same time creating more capital. The problem is how do you manage a redistrubution of capital without destroying the profit motive to create new resources? Short of a vast philosophical evolution I'm not sure how we will do that.
be careful what your wish for . . .in an insensative world were such had ideals. . . that means If I have to kill Trump to get what he has. . . .well that is what I gotta do Survival of the fittest . . . If I can steal it, Kill for it or con people out of it well . . I'm most fit and they were just weak Rocket River
If its not easy to move up here in the US, good luck moving up anywhere else, especially back in the "20's and 30's" Absolutely not. You have the choice to adapt (seek further education). The sad part of it is that most of these people do not have the intellect to further education, much less have the drive. They are led to believe that that this is what life has dealt them, so they will deal with it. Not so, everyone who is mentally compentant has a chance, regardless of the excuse ... some might be harder than others, but they DO have a chance. If you want to wither up and die, blaming it on your childhood, or race issues, or poverty or whatever, thats your choice. What is your suggestion? We both agree they have no resources to boost their economy. This is the case in many 3rd world countries. I suppose we should just continue sending them food for their "corrupt" government to take control. In the end, they don't get the food and they die. I guess we both agree on the same thing? Let me go ahead and add that i am on the lower end of the "totem pole". I can barely survive off my own salery, much less having a family. I was always one of the poorest kids in the school, but granted, I went to a very good school. I am trying to move up in life, furthering my education, sacraficing the luxeries of todays society, but i never use my past as a crutch.
There is a big difference between lazy and lacking the drive. I wouldn't say all poor people are lazy, but good luck finding a rich lazy person. If you are mentally incompetent, then no, you're not going to have a chance to suceed. I would call this stupid, and by no means, are poor people stupid. Ignorant, maybe, but everyone is ignorant in one way or another. Anyone can get over ignorance by applying themselves to further their education... and education doesn't neccessarily have to be from an institute.
The fittest doesn't mean the strongest. If you kill Trump and get all of his money, well then hey, you win. But we all know if you kill trump, you will at least get prison for life. I don't think this qualifies for the "fittest". There are many sucessful thieves and con men (corporate america??) They are living the high life (for now), so I would consider them the "fittest"... and everyone they swindled would be the weaker ones.
