P O V E R T Y

PRESENT:  

In this world, poverty is the dilemma pushed way back into the furthest corner, but not eradicated simply because we wouldn't be able to cope with the guilt.  In America alone, we generate enough food waste per year to weigh the equivalent of 74 Golden Gate Bridges! And yet there are those we know who don't have a meal for the next few days right down a few blocks.  Why are there still poor people in this world when statistics have been spewed over and over to our faces over the past years?   The answer is simple: selfishness.  It is said that the past is our biggest asset, revealing to us what we should and shouldn't do again; however, when I look at myself and this generation, I can't help but feel we haven't made that large of a difference.  The problem first boils down to individuals pointing their finger at themselves and asking, "Who? Me?!"  Today, I feel as if individuals are beginning to lose the realization and inspiration to actually believe they can make a difference.  Being the change has been rung so many times, for many it is just a cliche phrase; and when faced with the topic of poverty, I find myself thinking in the back of my head, "Ok, I'll go more to soup kitchen opportunities and let the government take care of the big picture."  It is this apathy that allows us to accomplish hardly anything.  Many people have found satisfaction in dumping problems onto the government, but even the government isn't doing much for poverty.  Surprisingly, and maybe not, we are not too different from the government.  As I read through one of my bookmarked articles on the government's role in poverty, I sensed that the government may not actually care about the poor on a personal level.  To them, solving poverty would simply take off the pressure and guilt from their shoulders, as well as benefitting the country monetarily and environmentally.  

FUTURE:  

Will poverty be eliminated in the future? No. I believe that no matter what, poverty will always be there looking at us.  Realistically, it is not possible to rally the entire world and end poverty.  I do believe that there are enough resources, money, and food for the world to all comfortably get through life, but then that would involve sharing and major sacrifices from a LOT of people.  The statistics predict that poverty numbers will in fact rise due to the link of higher populations and increase in monopolies.  Sachs said that "the poverty trap is self-reinforcing, not self-correcting" (31).  Poverty will not be eliminated, but that does not give us permission to fully sit back and relax.  It is rather all the more challenge to defy the numbers and do the best we can to make this world just perhaps a little better of a place than it is now for a lot of people.