What would it take to rid the world of poverty?

Question

What would it take to rid the world of poverty?

Answer 1

Lots of luck with this one. Equal education, motivation, Population restrictions. these are a couple of things.

Answer 2

Give everyone 40 goats, so I guess a lot a frisky goats.



Seriously though, there is no one universal definition of poverty. Some people think they are poor when they cannot afford $15 for antibiotics to save the life of their child. Others think they are poor when daddy does not buy them a new Mustang for graduation. The govenment of the USA and the government of China have definitions that vary almost as widely.



Within an economy, poverty also changes over time. My grandfather was not poor even though he had to quit school in the sixth grade to work the farm for his family.



To eliminate poverty you would first have to eliminate scarcity of goods. If we did that, there could be enough for everyone. If there was enough for everyone, the line would move again, and the new definition of poverty might be the necessity to work over 10 hours a week to afford your daughter's new Mustang for graduation.



All this about redistribution of wealth and the elimination of greed runs counter to human nature -- the communists tried that and discovered that people who can get the same for idleness as they can for work tend to be quite idle. The rich do serve a vital purpose. They accept risk when they invest in business and industry. They often educate their children in exceptional fashion and create true leaders such as Teddy Roosevelt and FDR. Many, such as Carnegie and now even Bill Gates, contribute huge sums of money to worthwhile programs without the barriers and compromises of government and in ways that actually make a difference.



By the American definitions of 100 years ago we have eliminated American poverty, although some people do still suffer because of their decisions or addictions or those of their loved ones. Heck, I'm six inches taller than my great-grandfather was because of differences in nutrition. I'm not much over average and he was considered a tall man in his time. I have a 12 year old daughter who is gaining on me fast.



I have changed my views with age and experience. I was a young democrat convinced that all the poor needed was a chance. After seeing many more helping hands extended than grasped, I became a republican convinced that the way to end poverty is to eliminate whining and sympathetic saints. It is not OK to have kids at 14. It is not OK to quit high school, gain a criminal record, and not even be employable at McDonalds.



There is no excuse to be poor in the USA today. I think we need to give those who claim poverty 40 goats and consider our social obligation met. Such an approach might just motivate some people to get their act together.

Answer 3

what a marvelous and interesting quesion....I just wish I had the answer!~ Here's some food for thought along those lines....On 60 Minutes, you know, it comes on immediately following the football game except on the west coast....well anyway, they were interviewing a ranking official within the Catholic church and the topic was poverty and how to deal with it on mass scale...the suggestion to the official was "why not melt down all that gold and sell off all those religious artifacts..they must be worth billions...and give the money to the less fortune"

The official responded in this way...."If you took all the money from all the rich people in the world and gave it to all the poor people of the world and then went to sleep for 5 years...when you woke up again the rich people would have all the money again and the poor would again be poor...it's like water finding it's own level....

Answer 4

It would take really opening all borders to free trade, so that each country could specialize in what they are best at producing. This would do amazing things in bringing people out of poverty, by boosting many poor country's economies. In regards to the aid the U.S. provides to other countries, we should focus more on providing education, especially in certain trades, so that people have skills to contribute to their society. Often times when we directly provide food or money, it is taken by the greedy leaders of the country we give it to, and it never reaches the people. If we provide education to people, no leader can take that away.



Also, I spent a semester studying environmental economics, and we spent some time focusing on population. Population is really not that out of control at this point. There are plenty of resources, we just need to allocate them efficiently on a global level, which could be done better if we had free trade amonst all countries. With our government's subsidies of farming, the prices of other poorer nation's crops are driven down, and it makes it more difficult for them to make a living. Population is not the problem.

Answer 5

A group of dedicated really smart people who could tackle issues like: Geography, Sociology, Engineers, Medical Staff, bunches of Cheifs, Biologists, Historians, Janitors, Transportation Engineers, Water Sanitations Personell.



Water control is one of the biggest causes of poverty. In Africa their will eventually be a continental war if the water rights are not agreeded upon and distributed to the masses of people. Already there is Genocide equal to what happened under Hitler's reign. The pictures we get from Africa, are cushioned. It is so dry, barren, and desolate that people are dying. I wonder why we don't just re-locate them, but I guess I've seen enough in the Middle East to understand how distrupting that is.



So, again, we'd need the people I listed above to be commited to solving this. To accomplish this we would need: WORLD PEACE .

Answer 6

Rid the world of greed and poverty ends.

Answer 7

Eliminate about 50% of the worldwide population. There are too many people out there and not enough energy and resourses to support the growing population.



However, if someone were to discover a way to cheaply control fusion reaction, we may be looking at almost limitless amount of energy production. Although even then, if there were trillion people living on the earth, it won't solve poverty.



So bottom line is to control population growth.

Answer 8

It would take a series of stages to rid the world of poverty, these stages would end many causes of poverty, which are war, class-divisions, imperialism, capitalism, etc. These stages are:



1. National Liberation - the Nation rids itself of foreign colonization or it gives up its foreign colonies, or in short the Nation rids itself of foreign-influence, internal and external. This stage of society is run by feudal lords and or former feudal lords.



2. Democratic Struggle - the majority of the people rule the government and through the majority rule, they gradually overthrow feudalism and abolish all social aspects of feudalism. This stage of society is run by the bourgeoisie.



3. Socialist Stage - the people overthrow the bourgeoisie democratically and achieve socialism, and experience socialism through materialist understanding of reality that it is the social and economic conditions of man which are the sole factors for the existance of man. And all the people are educated and to run the economy and society without the bourgeoisie and eventually without any ruling-class guiding the socialist transition, which is when the transition will be complete. This stage of society is run by the mental-laborers.



4. Communism - the people overthrow the mental-laborers and the society is divided into urban and rural proletariat. And the society is at the most closest to being fully egalitarian than ever, however the division of urban labor and rural labor divides the society into the final class-antagonism: the the minority urbanite proletariat and the majority whom are rustic proletariat. The lifestyle of the urban minority heavily rests upon reliance on foreign countries, and a lot of the gross domestic product and labor goes toward trade with the foreign countries to support the essential industrial lifestyle of the urbanites.



5. Autarky - The majority of whom are agrarian rustics overthrow the urbanite minority, and finally end all reliance on foreign raw materials to support industry, and abolish industry and the towns and cities and bring the urban and suburban populace to the countryside to make Autarky and total and complete equality. Through industry the urbanites polluted the air, land, and water, which are essential for the production of healthy food in the countryside. Also the urban/suburban industry is unneccessary, because the essential sector of economy is in the countryside, through which the food, clothing, and shelter of the people are produced. When all of the nations embrace autarky through the gradual over-throw of each class in each stage of society, then all class-antagonisms and national-antagonisms will cease to exist, and thus society would reach the most egalitarian, self-sufficient, un-exploitive, and environmentally friendly society.



In short the best way to rid the world of poverty is by utilizing the population, as the original source of energy for the economy rather than using artificial (industrial) means of energy such as oil, ethanol, solar power, etc., which require war and exploitation to gather the raw materials necessary for industrialism. Since food is the most essential commodity for ridding the world of poverty, the population should naturally be distributed over the countryside to engage in agriculture on a basis of using simple tools and raw human labor, to save the environment, provide jobs to all and maintain self-sufficiency and frugality at the same time.

Answer 9

A concertrated effort from all countries around the world, and trying to stabilize the population growth. The Earth can't substain many more people on this planet.

Answer 10

A really good first step would be to replace all the world leaders with women.

Answer 11

To have a planet full of people that have no idea of what greed is... who are prepared to do something for someone else, without expecting something back in return.

Answer 12

the leaders of the G8 to practice what they preach