Tag: poverty

Three Things Trump Can’t Do

I promise this blog won’t become a 100% Trump-rant, but there are big geopolitical events afoot. I’ll be chewing the Trump cud for a little longer.

This essay from science fiction author Charles Stross gave me some big-picture perspective. Reactionary populism is a global problem, and the Russia-as-puppeteer theory may have legs. The “U.S. won the cold war” narrative is looking laughable at this point. The Kremlin has a long memory, and plays a ruthless international chess game with decade-long turns.

Now we have an administration that is not only politically conservative (in an extreme way, with the intention to roll back women’s rights and civil rights) but also potentially incompetent, led by a president with a history of criminality and corruption. Trump’s corruption and impulsiveness worry me just as much as his ideology (which, like Bannon’s, is flexible and opportunistic). Reckless decision making, cynicism, cronyism, corruption, and a failure of leadership could lead to economic collapse and systemic breakdown. Could it be as bad as what we’re seeing now in Venezuela? I think our checks-and-balances will probably save us from that fate, but the same forces are at work.

Across the pond we have Brexit in the UK, and anti-immigration sentiments all across Europe. Global reactionary populism. Terrorism is also a massive problem. What’s happening to our planetary society? I think we’re seeing the convergence of at least six macrotrends:

Living On One Dollar

By J.D. Moyer

On January 21

In Culture Rants/Shares, Lifestyle Experiments

Living On One Dollar (now available on Netflix streaming)

Recently I watched and enjoyed the documentary film “Living On One Dollar” (available on Netflix streaming). Four American young men (two researchers and two filmmakers) live in rural Guatemala for a summer, strictly committing to a budget averaging US$7/week per person (randomized day to day to $0-$9 for the group). As you might predict, they have a hard time of it, and suffer from hunger, malnutrition, parasites, fatigue, and demoralization. On the brighter side, they form friendships with the locals, help others and are helped, learn a great deal about rural poverty, and produce a film well worth seeing.

Some things are cheaper in rural Guatemala than they are in the U.S. and Europe, but not by much. The men spent their meager budget on rice, beans, firewood, and transportation to and from the market. Bananas were an occasional treat. After weeks of near starvation the locals taught them to buy a small plastic bag of lard and add some to their mashed beans. They slept on a dirt floor and were bitten by fleas every night. At least one of them contracted both Giardia and E. coli. from contaminated water. For much of the time they were uncomfortable or miserable.

The locals seemed to live a little better. Some had saved up (by way of savings groups) to purchase wood stoves. One man in the village had a janitorial job in a nearby city and had used his regular income to improve his house and help his neighbors. Still, many of the locals suffered from this extreme poverty. One man described how when he had no money he witnessed his children stop growing. Some families had enough money to buy food for their children but not enough to buy them supplies for school. The film reminded me in a visceral way of something I already knew intellectually but had not considered in depth: very poor people have more choices, and much more difficult choices, than the top 80% (about 1 in 5 people around the world live on a dollar a day or less). A wrong decision has more serious consequences (like death); the very poor just can’t afford to take risks the way wealthier people can.

Microfinance

Many of the Guatemalan villagers had benefited from small microfinance loans (the local organization was Grameen). One woman borrowed a small amount of money to start a weaving business, and was thus able to resume her studies (she wanted to eventually become a nurse).

I was left with the impression that microfinance is a powerful and effective tool for alleviating poverty, especially when complemented by local savings groups. Any kind of financial flexibility is a huge boon for the extreme poor.

What Can the Top 80% Do To Help?

The four young men who made this film are big-hearted types, and care about the plight of their neighbors. During their time in the Guatemalan village they teach both English and Spanish (many of the locals speak only a Mayan dialect) and have since committed to continue making films to expose the plight of the extreme poor. This kind of film-making is important because it provides viewers the opportunity to get to know individuals who live in extreme poverty. We tend to feel more empathy when we get to know fathers, mothers, and children by name, people with their own dreams and aspirations, people just like us (as opposed to a monolithic group: people who live on less than a dollar a day).

So what can the rest of us do? At least four things:

1) We can support/vote for safety nets in our own country.
2) We can support/vote for universal benefits in our own country.
3) We can support microfinance organizations like Grameen and Kiva if we want to help internationally.
4) We can buy goods and services from poor countries (“Fair Trade” goods don’t necessarily help the extreme poor any more than goods without that label, but exports in general can truly boost national economies).

Poverty and Priorities in the United States

In the United States, many people are considered to live in poverty. However, we are a rich country, and most who are considered impoverished have a roof over their heads, have enough to eat, have access to emergency healthcare, and own a television.

After the Great Depression, the U.S. implemented safety nets, and they worked. Extreme poverty (living on a dollar a day or less) does not exist in the United States. Some among the chronic homeless in the United States arguably have a lower quality of life than the rural poor in Guatemala, but even the homeless in the U.S. have less food scarcity.

Our challenge in the United States is one of massive income inequality, and poor services for the most disadvantaged (such as the mentally ill). Some of these problems can be alleviated with expanding universal public services (such as preschool, higher education, and healthcare). Though the United States lags in these areas compared to Europe, there is reason for optimism. Oklahoma leads the way in terms of providing universal early education. Utah is solving homelessness with its “apartment first, questions later” strategy (drug and alcohol treatment programs turn out to be more effective if a person has a roof over their head). Even though our healthcare system ranks last among wealthy western nations, many U.S. citizens receive affordable healthcare via Medicare, Medicaid, and other federal programs.

Are we heading in the right direction in terms of social welfare for the poor? Conservative Americans are concerned about the immorality and unfairness of “government handouts,” but investing in early childhood education, making sure everyone can get basic healthcare, and getting homeless people off the streets are no-brainers; such “handouts” raise quality of life for everybody. We should prioritize these kinds of universal benefits; they are the low-hanging fruit in terms of alleviating suffering, investing in our nation’s future, and being the kind of country that inspires pride and patriotism.

Cult of the Individual, Cult of the Free Market

There is a brand of individualism and extreme libertarianism rampant in Silicon Valley, but also in other parts of the United States, fueled by the author Ayn Rand.

Ayn Rand’s books are like Lord of the Rings for conservatives. They are pure fantasy. Utopian political fantasy, but fantasy nonetheless. Ayn Rand’s fiction exalts the power of the individual and the free market and vilifies collectivism to such an extent that residents of the fictional settlement Galt’s Gulch in Atlas Shrugged never even lend things to each other — instead they negotiate a rental agreement. Everyone must pay their own way. Rand’s books fuel the philosophies of dozens of influential U.S. capitalists and conservative politicians, including Peter Thiel, Rand Paul, and Paul Ryan.

I bring up Rand because many people influenced by her actively campaign against social welfare programs that alleviate poverty. If they had their way, safety nets would be abolished and life for the poor in the United States would much more resemble life in rural Guatemala.

The free market creates wealth; few dispute that. What it doesn’t do is distribute wealth, and as it turns out the wealth doesn’t “trickle down” at all. Instead it tends to concentrate at the top. Technology accelerates that process; technology increases productivity and makes most jobs redundant, but that productivity boon only benefits business and capital owners (not workers). The Ayn Rand fantasy of pure individualism and an unregulated free-market, once conceived as a bulwark against totalitarian communism, now does more harm than good.

To hear how the average European perceives this insanity, listen to Tim Ferriss interview British polymath Ed Cooke (I think the Ayn Rand exchange is in part 2 but both parts are worth listening to). If the libertarian conservatives increase their political power (and they might), the United States could see a dangerous acceleration of income inequality, a gutting of social safety nets, and a dramatic rise in homelessness. Cooke deconstructs the “cult of the individual” quite eloquently.

Let Them Eat Cake

Yesterday on my way to the bank I walked through an intersection in Oakland. Every lane divider was occupied by a man with a sign asking for spare change (if you’re curious about the demographics, two were young and white, one was middle-aged and black). Later I drove to San Francisco and saw at least half a dozen people sleeping in doorways.

The local situation is mirrored globally. 80 people now own as much as the world’s bottom 50% (each of those extremely rich people owns as much as about 44 million other people in the bottom half). According to Piketty the situation is heading towards even more dramatic wealth concentration.

How does it end? There are two ways … the wealthy and middle classes find ways to push opportunity and quality of life down the economic spectrum, or …

Take your pick!

Pick the Low-Hanging Fruit, Part I (Charity)

By J.D. Moyer

On April 4

In Utopian Speculations

Some people prefer to do things the hard way.

I’ve always been interested in how to get the best results with the least possible effort. Some might call this quality laziness, but I prefer to think of it as efficiency. Why not get the most bang for your buck, in every area of life?

I’d like to explore the analogy of “low-hanging fruit” in various life areas — what behaviors can lead us to radical life improvements — either for ourselves or others — with reasonably low expenditures of willpower, money, time, and other resources we hold dear?

CHARITY
This might seem like a strange category to start with, but the act of giving without expecting anything material or concrete in return pays enormous emotional dividends. Whenever I’m feeling down about myself for any reason (what I have or haven’t achieved in life, who does or doesn’t love or respect me, etc. etc.) I can always fall back on the reassuring thought that at least I’m not a totally selfish bastard — I give away some of my hard-earned cash to good causes. What I consider to be a good cause is no doubt different that what you consider to be a good cause — I’m not going to try to convince you to donate to The SETI Institute, like I do (most people just don’t get that one — I’ll save my interest in SETI for a later post).

Alien hunters need to know what time it is.

But there are some charities that are just no-brainers. Everyone should give to them, because the work they do is incredibly effective, they’re transparent, and their efforts ripple out to form massive waves of goodness throughout the world. These organizations are picking the low-hanging fruit in terms of raising quality of life on this planet, and we should all help them out.

WHY SOME PEOPLE AREN’T YET DONATING A PORTION OF THEIR WEALTH TO THE WORLD’S POOR
There are several factors that prevent people from experiencing the simple pleasure of sharing their wealth with the less fortunate, including:

Fear of waste and corruption — is my money actually reaching people in need or is it in fact contributing to the oversized salary of some nonprofit executive? Or being spent on expensive mailing campaigns to ask me for even more money?
General nihilism: There are too many problems in the world, and my $20 isn’t going to make a difference, so why not just keep it in my pocket?
Deferred giving — I’ll give when I’m wealthier but right now I really need the money.
Confused Malthusian (or Social Darwinian) thinking.

The burden of the first question (waste and corruption) lies squarely on the shoulders of the charitable organization in question — it’s up to them to somehow convince you they won’t waste your money.

The second issue — the question of whether or not any of us can make a difference — it’s partially up to the charitable organization and the inspired individuals behind it to rally our cynical, lazy asses into action. The rest of the burden falls on our own shoulders. We can look at positive historical events not from the perspective of predestined inevitability, but rather through the lens of active manifestation; individuals and groups brought these positive events into existence through vision and work. If we can do this, then we can imagine a brighter future manifesting through our present actions. It’s worth considering the following: if we can’t imagine creating a better life for the poorest and least fortunate people in the world, how can we imagine and create a better life for ourselves? How is the process any different?

The third question — should we give now or later, when we’re richer — this question falls entirely on the shoulders of the individual. In terms of a response, let me put it this way — if it’s so hard to part with your crappy twenty now, will it be easier to donate $20,000 to a good cause once you’re “in the money?” It won’t be. Giving when you’re the most poor actually makes the most sense. It will immediately change your mindset from one of scarcity and powerlessness to one of abundance and empowerment.

The fourth question is trickiest. Deeply wrong beliefs about human nature may lurk in our subconscious minds — and they need to be confronted directly. Do, we, on some level, believe that we have access to clean water, abundant food, and material wealth because we are more deserving? Or inherently better, more intelligent, or somehow “fitter”?

Why some societies are richer than others — this is a deep question, and I think Jared Diamond answers it best in his book Guns, Germs, and Steel. I’ll offer a spoiler — the fact that you live in a wealthy society (if you do) has nothing to do with deserving it, or earning it. But there are answers to the question, and they have a lot to do with the words in the title of the book.

What about Malthus? Do you have a hidden Malthusian side to your thinking … that if you help provide water and health care for the masses of impoverished brown people around the world that they’ll go and make more poor brown people and soon the entire planet will be overrun with poor brown people and that will ruin it for everyone? That would put you in the same camp as Ebenezer Scrooge; “If they would rather die they had better do it, and decrease the surplus population.”

The good Reverend Malthus was right to be concerned about overpopulation. He was dead wrong, however, in his superficially logical idea that famine, disease, and other calamities do anything to check human population growth. Have you looked around? There’s no shortage of people, anywhere, despite our rich global history of plagues, devastating wars, and horrific famines. The only thing that has put a real dent in global population is the eruption of Mt. Toba 74,000 years ago. People, like raccoons, respond to terrible hardship by making more of ourselves, even if our overall quality of life suffers. For example, after our ancestors killed and ate most of the planet’s megafauna, we switched to eating a less nutritious, but more reliable, grain-based diet. Result = more people than ever (though we’re now generally shorter and more prone to degenerative disease than our paleolithic ancestors).

The real solution to global overpopulation is doing everything we can to raise the quality of life for the world’s poorest people, especially women. In general, when literacy, access to contraception (aka “family planning”), and access to basic health care go up, birth rates go down.

charity:water

Yummy water vs. yucky water.

This organization builds wells to provide clean water to poor communities throughout the world. That’s all they do. Every dollar you donate goes to building a well. When I first heard about charity:water, it sounded like a good idea. Once I learned about the ripple effects of having clean water, it sounded like a great idea.

Women and children in many communities spend hours every day hauling water from distant sources. The time spent gather water precludes paying work for the women and education for the children. By providing a well, you provide precious time to that community, which translates into increased wealth, knowledge, and self-determination.
Clean water prevents disease. Disease wreaks havoc in every area of life.
Clean water provides dignity. Water is needed not just for drinking, but for bathing.

The “Why Water” section of their website explains their philosophy and work better than I can — have a look:

http://www.charitywater.org/whywater/

Don’t be put off by the “slickness” of charity:water‘s website and presentation. They consciously uses good design, high definition video, and modern communication modes (like Twitter) to reach people more effectively, but these factors don’t represent wasted money. The organization’s admin costs are 100% covered by private supporters, clothing sales, and other non-donation related revenue, and things like good design and high quality video and photography aren’t even necessarily expensive these days.

Founder Scott Harrison has an interesting story. At 28 he was making a killing in the clubbing world as a promoter, and more or less got sick of himself. At that point he decided to dedicate his life to helping the poor. In his own words (skip to 4:00):

http://www.charitywater.org/about/scotts_story.php

Your Jackson = clean drinking water for this kid for 20 years. Questions?

I’m impressed by the transparency of charity:water. Their website includes a feature where you can use Google Maps to look at the water projects. If you click on one of the marked locations, a picture of the well and some of the local residents pops up, along with a short blurb about their previous water source, how long they had to walk to get water before the well was built, etc. The Water Projects page displays each project in the context of a large infographic (which I’m glad is backed up by pictures and video and map locations — infographics are pretty but they don’t prove anything).

charity:water claims that a $20 donation translates into providing clean drinking water for one person for 20 years. I don’t see any reason to doubt them on this, and it’s a remarkable statistic. If it came down to it, you would probably pay well over $20 a day to provide clean water for yourself, wouldn’t you? If you’ve been to Burning Man, you’ve probably done that already!

For $20, you’re not only giving someone access to clean water every day for twenty years, you’re also providing them with an extra 1-4 hours every day of free time (time not hauling water). How much would *you* pay for an extra hour or four a day for the next twenty years? More than $20?

There are lots of complicated problems in the world that need solving. In general, providing clean drinking water isn’t one of them. Go to a poor community and build a high quality, easy-to-maintain well. Problem solved for that community, at least for a good chunk of time. Low-hanging fruit all the way.

If any of this makes sense to you, you might enjoy donating to charity:water directly:

http://www.charitywater.org/donate/

Some other organizations that, IMO, fit in the low-hanging fruit category:

CARE (especially the “Mothers Matter” campaign)
http://www.care.org/campaigns/2009/mothersmatters.asp

SAVE THE CHILDREN
http://www.savethechildren.org/

HEIFER INTERNATIONAL
http://www.heifer.org/

WORLD VISION
http://www.worldvision.org/
World Vision has its roots in Christian evangelism, but their primary work is fighting extreme poverty. Like Nicholas Kristof, I would rather see the Christian evangelists engaged in fighting poverty rather than fighting abortion rights.

Tag: poverty

Three Things Trump Can’t Do

Share this:

Living On One Dollar

Share this:

Pick the Low-Hanging Fruit, Part I (Charity)

Share this: