Eradication of Poverty

Yesterday was the International Day for the Eradication of Poverty. What a sad commentary on our world that we need a whole day to remind us in the West that much of the world is suffering in unimaginable levels of destitution. But why haven't we alleviated poverty yet? Have we failed to give enough?

The answer is NO. In short, we have given more than "enough" over the past 50 years. In fact, the West (North America and Europe) have given trillions (with a "T") in the last 50 years. That is more than enough money to completely pull every poor person on the planet out of destitution, and yet it hasn't. Why?

In short, there are two reasons: corruption and planning.

In case you didn't know, most of the world lives under a government that is corrupt. In other words, when their country is given aid by the West, most of it goes to line the pockets of those at the top of the food chain all the way down to those just above the bottom of the food chain. Why deliver mosquito nets to a village when you can sell them yourself and use the profit to buy better building materials for your house? Why ensure that medicine gets delivered if your boss doesn't really care and you will get paid either way? Why not give cushy jobs to family members instead of people who will actually perform an assignment? Corruption kills the best laid plans.

And that leads us to the second reason that poverty has yet to be eradicated. Plans. You see, capitalism actually works. And capitalism isn't a plan. That's socialism. Socialism attempts to lock smart people into a room and have them decide what is best for the rest of us. Capitalism says that you should decide what is best for you and if you want something, you should be responsible to get it for yourself.

So take for example the release of the most recent Harry Potter book. Millions of copies were delivered in multiple languages to children (and nerdy adults like me) all over the world ON THE SAME DAY! And yet we can't get mosquito nets to children who will die without them this month. If you and I can get a book, why can't we get nets to kids?

And in the question lies the problem. In order to eradicate poverty we need to move from the attitude that WE need to get mosquito nets to THEM, and instead realize that WE need to do everything we can to make the nets attainable by ANYONE who would GO LOOKING for them.

Poverty is not something you and I can plan away. It must be climbed out of by those who are finally given the chance. But you and I can work to give more people that chance.

For more thoughts on this subject read the excellent book "White Man's Burden" by William Easterly. For more on how you can help give people a chance to get out of poverty, email me.