The cost of fixing things.

[green-man-2010.livejournal.com]

Back in the 80s, I  went to a presentation on world poverty being run by a group called The Hunger Project.

One of the arguments being discussed was that poverty was not inevitable. we had , after all, put a man on the moon - so could we not end poverty on Planet Earth?

Think of the cost of giving every child on Earth a decent home with running water, with proper sanitation, and then giving all those children a primary education and then an adequate diet. the cost would run into astronomical figures.

I was actually shown the figure on a screen - a huge number with a whole string of noughts on the end.
" And yet, " the speaker told us " this is what the UK spends every year on chocolate and sweets, its what Europeans spend every month on alcohol, and it's what the USA spends every day on armaments."

Wow!

A more recent figure put it at three trillion US dollars. A trillion = 1,000,000,000,000.  It's a thousand billions, and a billion is a thousand millions. That is a lot of money - and yet, I wonder  how much that would come to in terms of government spending? Is it an accurate estimate even? It must be added that the money needs to be spent wisely and not funnelled off by corrupt dictators - but what would the cost be of eliminating endemic poverty , and could the world actually raise that amount?

Comments

[chessdev.livejournal.com]

I bet:

1. I *do* have a better idea just based on the stories of my friends/coworkers I see

2. I *am* in a position to make that determination

The point is his "hardship/bootstrap" story is tough by American standards but would be virtually IMPOSSIBLE in other countries;

[gunslnger.livejournal.com]

1. If you think his (or my) opinion is based solely on his personal experience, then you're just moronic.

2. No more than he or I are.

No, the point is that people's choices affect what happens to them, regardless of the circumstances they have to make the choices in.

[sealwhiskers.livejournal.com]

The point actually is that there are situations and places where there aren't much of a choice at all.

[gunslnger.livejournal.com]

Which he explicitly called out and identified as not covered. Instead, you're claiming that those situations and places cover almost everything, with no support.

[sealwhiskers.livejournal.com]

It is covered explicitly under the discussion of dictatorship/extreme poverty and revolutions, and how the dynamics work. There are two fractions in here, roughly speaking, one which seem to understand history and one which doesn't, one which seems to think it all comes down to personal action, and nothing should be done to interfere with that, and one which says that it is not as simple as that, and which disregards the direct transference of structural anecdotes from one completely different part of the world to another.

You claiming that there *is* support in one point of view and not in another adds virtually nothing to the discussion however.

[gunslnger.livejournal.com]

At least you recognize that you don't understand history.

[sealwhiskers.livejournal.com]

That would be more than you do then, heh...

[chessdev.livejournal.com]

2. No more than he or I are.

I highly doubt his ability to judge this is the same as mine, based on what he has said and not realized what he has said.

No, the point is that people's choices affect what happens to them, regardless of the circumstances they have to make the choices in.

Oh stop it now! That is revising the argument.

What HE said was that people **chose** to be poor, now you're chaning it to "people's choices affect what happens to them".

Noone is arguing that choices impact your life, but we ARE arguing that all people living under a regime have to do is "chose" to not take it anymore.

Honestly

[gunslnger.livejournal.com]

No, he didn't say that, that's what you heard because that's what you expect to hear.

[chessdev.livejournal.com]

No, that is actually what he said.

He then went and used his own life experience as some attempt of "cred" to show he understood what poverty was like -- and further exposed numerous assumptions on structure, support, and choices available that were cooked into his premise.

Are you actually reading the responses people post to him, or just skimming for keywords?

[gunslnger.livejournal.com]

Yes, I'm actually reading everything. His assumptions aren't cooked into the premise, but you are dismissing the anecdote because you think they are.

[chessdev.livejournal.com]

So I listed which assumptions were cooked into his premise. How exactly are they *not* cooked into his premise?

[gunslnger.livejournal.com]

He explicitly stated that the solution is to change the systems that people in poverty are operating under. The example he gave is to show how being in such a system in the U.S. allowed for getting out of poverty, even in spite of the uncontrollable external factors. The things you listed aren't assumptions, they're the goals.

Sheesh....so much wrong...

[chessdev.livejournal.com]

It's a massive abuse of the word "choice"
to say people *choose* to be in poverty when
the fundamental infrastructure to enable choices is missing or not even allowed.

The problem is with his word choice. CHOICE indicates that multiple options exist currently. If they don't, then they are NOT choices. Get it?

Now, his argument essentially boils down to:

The people have not risen up to be slaughered by their government, thus they CHOOSE to be poor and abused.


Ignoring who has the weapons in many 3rd world countries; Ignoring the governments can call on help while the citizens usually cannot; Rastillio's comparison of his experience to theirs dont line up by several orders of magnitude.

In other words -- the comparison was bullshit.


So we have an argument of "choice" that abuses the notion of the word; We have false comparisons; And we have a confusion of goals and actual possibilities


I have a GOAL of living in a mansion someday -- but that doesn't mean my not living in one right now was a *choice*. I didnt CHOOSE to *not* live in a mansion. See the difference?

Re: Sheesh....so much wrong...

[gunslnger.livejournal.com]

Once again, you fail to understand what's being said and you continue on with what you already believe is being said.

Re: Sheesh....so much wrong...

[chessdev.livejournal.com]

Once again, you fail to address a single point and repeat the same mantra.

"the goal....treat possibility AS reality..."

which boils down to

"Accept his blame of other people, even if reality *doesnt* let them live any other way"

and you haven't given a single reason why we should.