This bible principle the remedy for poverty?

OldWiseGuy said:

First things first. There are too many people. Thanks to technology we don't need everyone working in order to provide our needs and goodies. While overpopulation provides 'consumers' for goods and services too many cannot pay for them as they don't have jobs. To mitigate this credit is expanded to dangerous levels, thus the pickle we find ourselves in. So a long term goal must be to reduce population growth to reasonable levels. For the immediate needs government work programs are the most practical way of getting money into the hands of the poor. Properly supervised these workers can add value to the infrastructure of the country. We just have to get the government to buy into such a plan.

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I agree with you on this post.

As to government works projects, our infrastructure is crumbling and we actually have an enormous need for that work to be done, not just people putting up parks and monuments. Trouble is getting someone to pay for it. We need more revenue (which means more taxes) to pay for all that work, and most of the people with the most money to spare aren't sharing.

Ha Ha. That makes me laugh. The US is the last place on Earth to control anything by taxation. If you could, you wouldn't have the budget deficit you do ($160k per taxpayer). But higher taxes are not something the US powers that be, and the general US population, take readily to. Electing a government on a commitment to tax more is just not going to be a happening thing, so far as I can make out.

Cheers, Strivax.

OldWiseGuy said:

That's an easy problem to fix. Bypass the Fed and pay for such work directly from the Treasury (the printing press). $500 Billion plus leaves our shores each year via the trade deficit. Why backfill with more debt when we can print cash and pay it directly for these programs. It would be "money from heaven". If money continues to leave we continue to print not borrow. Inflation can be controlled through taxation. Take it out and burn it.

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To avoid taxation we should create inflation and then control that inflation with taxation?

Strivax said:

Electing a government on a commitment to tax more is just not going to be a happening thing, so far as I can make out.

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Well depends on who you tax. Bernie got so popular because he wants to tax the heck out of the rich. More people would get behind those kinds of things if the Republicans hadn't convinced so many people they are "really" about being socially conservative and that somehow we need to fight a war against the poor instead of a war against poverty.

We got libertarians that are financially conservative and socially liberal for a bit of middle ground. Where's the party that is financially liberal and socially conservative? That party could annihilate the Republican party after some time, I would think.

OldWiseGuy said:

Haven't we been dealing with poverty for generations now? Why so little progress?

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Simple answer? All of the economic systems that have existed since the dawn of agricultural society have relied on some people being kept in poverty. Currently, some regions have cheap labor as their primary economic strength (especially in the developing world, but also in the U.S.). Some extractive industries take more out of a region than they put back in, like coal mining in Appalachia or rare-earth metal production in the DRC. As it stands, a handful of people become very wealthy and very powerful primarily because other people are not. It's difficult to solve the problem of poverty under any circumstances, because it's a complicated issue that traps people in a vicious cycle. It's impossible if there are elements in society who benefit from its existence.

Another problem is that we have lumped all so-called impoverished people into one group and made a socio-economic class of them. Break the problem down into manageable sized parts and maybe we can make some progress.

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Actually, most socioeconomic models subdivide the poor into various groups. Obviously there are as many reasons for poverty as there are people living in poverty, but knowing that isn't actually very useful for academic or public policy reasons. Many of those people have similar reasons for their situation, and it's only through addressing those reasons that we can make meaningful change.

quatona said:

Look, here´s another example:
I have a pile of rocks on end A of my garden.
I want it moved to the other end B. So I´ll pay you 100$ for moving it there.
Next day, I notice it´s in the wrong place, and find it worth paying you another 100 bucks to move it back to A.
I keep changing my mind every day, for one month. You have been payed 30.000$, I found it worth paying this money to you.
The pile is where it was in the beginning. Nobody else even cares whether it is on end A or end B.
Now, have we increased the amount of value of which, say, food can be bought?



It´s all in the definition of "advantageous". When you buy something that´s worthless to the rest of the world, that´s not economically advantageous to you. It doesn´t create actual growth.

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If we hire a tutor to teach you simple arithmetic would that increase the wealth of the world?

OldWiseGuy said:

I didn't mention avoiding taxation. Taxes must be increased, and the money supply must be increased as well. This will add equity (debt-free money) to the economy, and increase tax revenues. The early levels of inflation are a good thing. Inflation indicates growth up to a certain point.

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Okay. I said the problem was getting more taxes on rich folk, and I thought that's the problem you were trying to avoid.

I'd be wary of printing more money, though, into a system that, as of right now, has a disproportionate amount of wealth moving upwards. Sure, extra money being pumped into the lower and middle classes would be good in the short term, but when it gets spent, too much moves upwards and then it will just sit up in the higher rungs of society.

keith99 said:

If we hire a tutor to teach you simple arithmetic would that increase the wealth of the world?

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Oops.

OldWiseGuy said:

Haven't we already addressed the main reasons? In many cases the "lack of opportunity" is a reflection of the lack of education . Criminal behavior is a ticket to poverty, as is teenage kids becoming parents. I think the answers are there but action is needed on the part of the poverty class.

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So, I'm not sure I like the idea that the poor are wilfully ignorant, or criminal, or profligate, or promiscuous, and that is the reason for their poverty. In my experience, rich people can also be wilfully ignorant, and criminal, and profligate, and promiscuous. The difference is this, that the rich have money, and can rescue themselves from the consequences of an immorality that afflicts all mankind, not just the poor.

Cheers, Strivax.

OldWiseGuy said:

Money is like blood. It all goes through the heart (rich people and government) but it also circulates through the whole system, available to those who have jobs. Once in their hands they can spend it on drugs, alcohol, cigarettes, $100 sneakers, gold teeth and chains, etc., or they can use it to lift themselves out of poverty. If they choose the former who are we to criticize?

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Wow. Just...wow. They spend it on rent and mortgages, healthcare and prescriptions, food and clothing, and diapers, etc. And a disproportionate amount of the money paid for those things goes up instead of ever circulating back down.

Also...

OldWiseGuy said:

Criminal behavior is a ticket to poverty

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Criminal behavior is a symptom of poverty.

quatona said:

Oops.

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Elegant, no really, you have shown you made a simple mistake in a very convincing way.

OldWiseGuy said:

If they spend their money on these things I doubt if they are in poverty. All these products are produced by big companies. Where else would they buy them, and how would these companies return their money?

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People aren't in poverty unless they're homeless and their children are dying of infection, disease, and hypothermia?

OldWiseGuy said:

So, how has crime (as a remedy) helped to solve the poverty problem?

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A symptom isn't a remedy. When I have strep throat, I cough. It doesn't cure my infection, it just eases the itch in the back of my throat for a bit.