How can we end poverty?

When war ends

Redefine it. The two current definitions (especially Relative poverty) will always have people that fit it. Although I suppose killing everyone who is destitute would work in theory to eliminate absolute poverty it would have to be a constant activity as new people meet the criteria. (Edit: I read a story about that somewhere, not sure where, the link I had here was not it)

I think money is here to stay, for at least the next few hundred or few thousand years (I am optimistic about our survival), so I think as long as money is around, people are going to have to aquire it to avoid poverty. Eventually we will probably get back to nature, but in the meantime we will have to use the school system opportunity that everyone in “first world countries” are presented with, to encourage people to become creative minds. A creative mind is valuable and therefore well paid. I think down the road we will develop more methods to realize and express our creativity. I can imagine inventions which will make it more of an instant process, where everyone can instantly contribute. In that kind of world everyone has a value.

Define and make continually available, basic resources, to all who need it. That’s not as unbelievably challenging in terms of raw action and technology as one might think. What it does take is a vast and long term commitment and a significant down-stepping of greed that I don’t see any nation being willing to seriously undertake.

After that you’re talking, potentially, about total assessment and redistribution of non-basic resources, which isn’t really necessary or in humanities best interest.

On a more tangible level, with regard to current poverty-stricken developing countries throughout the world, I think there are two poverty alleviation tools that are far and away more effective than any other:

Property Rights, and Microfinance.

There are hundreds of thousands of people in the developing world (far below the poverty line) who actually live and work on the land, and could make a decent living if they had the rights to that land. (For comparison, imagine how much easier it is to get a business loan if you already own a house, or a piece of property that can be put up as collateral). Helping people gain legal ownership of the (often otherwise unused or unclaimed) land they live on has been incredibly effective in bringing people out of poverty.

Likewise, Microfinance has been perhaps the most effective tool in helping people help themselves out of poverty. With average repayment rates between 95% and 98%, recipients of micro loans have a better repayment rate that most traditional loans. Millions of people throughout the world have started their own business through micro loans, and have improved their quality of living sustainably.

Frankly, if you’re interested in solving global poverty, or world hunger, or childhood disease.. investing in programs that work with microfinance or property rights are among your best bets for having the largest, longest term impact on peoples’ lives. While there are clearly hundreds of other fantastic programs out there, that also do a lot of good in the world, when it comes to poverty, these two types of programs are the most sustainable, long term solutions.

Stop thinking only of ourselves for once, and think of what’s important for the greater good of us ALL. Our behavior works it’s way up to the final bastion of money-holders, the administration, and how they deal with social services and handing out money to different states.

What we buy, where we buy it, what we do with our disposable income—all contribute to defining what is important to Americans and what is not. And don’t think the government is not listening. So, if you’re really concerned about poverty, stop complaining and do something about it. Stop buying up everything in stores to keep up with the latest trends, and buy locally, to begin with.

And what @Evan said.

@Evan is the closest thing to spot-on I’ve seen on this subject in a while. I would also add “reduce the population of the world by about 90%” so we can quit with the Malthusian tragedies, and then also “change human nature” to make us more collective.

We can’t. It is a byproduct of society.

We can have all the pipe dreams we want. And it is a good thing to try to accomplish.

But just as we produce waste material after we eat, poverty is also an ugly fact.

I feel as though I frequently hear people touting the idea that poverty is simply a fact of life, or an unavoidable by-product of human nature, or at the very least of capitalism.

I take issue with that.

I agree that as long as we operate in a capitalist society, there will be people have more money than other people. There will be rich, and there will be poor. But poor and poverty are really not the same thing.

As much as I hate citing people (and espeically hate citing John Rawls), I do belive that there can be a baseline within a capitalist system that we as a society choose to set as the bare minimum. We can choose to create a world where poor vs. rich may be up to the individual, but living in abject poverty is not something we will tolerate.

In the end, I may be wrong about that being achievable.. but really that’s a philosophical issue that we haven’t even reached yet. I say this because even if poverty at some level is an absolute fact of a capitalist system, the current levels of poverty that exist in our world are above and beyond whatever that absolute may turn out to be.

I say this because it’s as clear as clear can be that small changes to how we do things (without abandoning a capitalist system) can bring millions of people out poverty. If we can live in a capitalist world and yet still bring all these people out of poverty, then we certainly haven’t reached the point where poverty is simply an unavoidable evil.

@Thesexier Surely war ins’t the only cause of poverty? As @laureth pointed out, over population is also a huge problem. Although I agree that war causes some of the worst, if not the worse, atrocities we’ve seen, I’m not sure I see it as the final solution to poverty.

@davidgro To be honest, I have no interest in removing relative poverty, at least not in a society anywhere close to what exists today. A difference in wealth and living standards (to some degree) is what spurs innovation, so its good for the world. As for absolute poverty, you seem convinced that its here to stay. Why is that? Because of capitalism? Because some people will always be lazy? Because there isn’t enough useful work to go around?

@Evan As for property rights, I think your spot on. However, I don’t see any reasonable mechanism for this. If we start arbitrarily redistributing land, people won’t have confidence that what they own now won’t be redistributed later. In that case, why would they work for what they have?

As for micro finance, I’m a fairly big believer in it, but there are some issues. One is that they need to charge incredible interest rates. Usually around 30% (plus with fees the effective interest rate could be higher). This isn’t out of greed, but a result of operational costs. unlike a regular bank, they need to go to the villages and spend a lot of time each week (yes, each week, since most have weekly repayments[1]) and spend time talking to the clients. They also need to do checks to make sure the loan is being properly utilized, follow up on bad payment, do all the book keeping, search for funding from banks, etc… On top of that, many clients struggle with the weekly repayments. Some of them have seasonal jobs (some kinds of farming) and some of them may not engage in activities that produce very regular cash flows. There is some evidence that they even go back to money lenders on occasion to help them out on the odd week. This isn’t, in itself, a horrible thing, but it does give one pause. In any event, there are institutions trying to solve this problem but its not that easy. Finally, there are studies that show that micro finance doesn’t necessarily help. The logic of the studies has been disputed, but not all the experts agree on how useful it is.

@Siren I tend to agree, but I’m fairly biased. I could care less about current trends, I just buy whats functional, so if thats nearby, I’ll get it. So I’m a bad person to comment on this.

@ChazMaz, @Evan I’m hard pressed on this one. In the world, some people will be more useful than others. Some people will be lazy. Some people will fail at most things in life. And some people will succeed no matter what the circumstances. I don’t believe that anyone can do anything, so it seems like some poverty must exist in a capitalist society. But, I do agree with @wonderingwhy that there are probably some very small changes people could make to help out a lot of people. After all, the exchange rate between richer countries and poorer ones is so much in favor of the richer ones that a small sacrifice leads to huge returns.

[1] Why weekly payments? To ensure that the money doesn’t get spent again. If you allow monthly repayments, then maybe the money earned each week would be used for other, not so productive uses.

@roundsquare – With regard to property rights, it’s not a matter of land redistribution, although land redistribution took place in many countries throughout this century, and while the results were often mixed, there were some instances where it was done well, and to the genuine benefit of the majority of the population. I’m sure this could be argued, but nonetheless, land redistribution isn’t in and of itself a failed idea.

Either way, land redistribution isn’t the issue. It’s property rights management. (i.e. people who live on a piece of land, and work it, but don’t own it) And it’s not a question of their being a reasonable mechanism for it. There are people out there now, people who have been out there for a while now working on it, and making an incredible difference.

And as for microfinance, there will always be some problems with every system, and there will also always be cynics. But the truth is that it does work, and it works better than just about anything else.

I think my post here would just drag on and on if I were to respond individually to each of the detriments you listed.. so instead just look at a group like the Grameen Bank. They’re the larges microfinance group in the world; the founder, Muhammad Yunus, won the Nobel Peace Prize a few years back because he basically invented the modern form of microfinance, and while neither they nor anyone else is perfect, there is really almost no legitimate doubt by anyone in the field of global development or poverty alleviation that what they do is beyond effective.

Absolutely free, safe, effective birth control for anyone world-wide who wants it. Number of mouths to feed is a huge factor in poverty.

I am NOT a believer in this but some say to stop all aid to poor foreign countries. Many of the world’s poor will die off (as they believe nature intends).

Education.

@roundsquare
I believe poverty will always exist for a combination of the reasons you list and a few others. In first-world nations “Lazyness” is one category but there are also plenty of people who for various reasons lack the mental stability to handle working (at all) beyond begging, or even saving money they receive from social programs. That many of them are also hooked on drugs/alcohol/cigarettes makes their prospects even worse.

In addition, especially right at the moment, yes there really isn’t enough work to go around. Although this is always a much worse problem outside of the first-world nations.

I do, however believe that realistically, improvements can be made (especially in the 3rd-world), but not drastic enough to make the huge differences implied by the question (not on a short enough time scale anyway.)

As much as I agree things like @crankywithakeyboard‘s (first) answer, (I don’t know enough about @Evan‘s solution) there’s not just the expense, there’s also tradition and human nature that you would be fighting. Simply put, not enough people want it because they want their family line to continue.