[POVERTY] Causes, Effects And Possible Solutions

Poverty is about not having enough money to meet basic needs including food, clothing and shelter.  However, poverty is more, much more than just not having enough money.

The World Bank Organization describes poverty in this way:

“Poverty is hunger. Poverty is lack of shelter. Poverty is being sick and not being able to see a          doctor. Poverty is not having access to school and not knowing how to read. Poverty is not                having a job, is fear for the future, living one day at a time.

Poverty has many faces, changing from place to place and across time, and has been                      described in many ways.  Most often, poverty is a situation people want to escape. So poverty is        a call to action -- for the poor and the wealthy alike -- a call to change the world so that many          more may have enough to eat, adequate shelter, access to education and health, protection              from violence, and a voice in what happens in their communities.”

In addition to a lack of money, poverty is about not being able to participate in recreational activities; not being able to send children on a day trip with their schoolmates or to a birthday party; not being able to pay for medications for an illness.  These are all costs of being poor. Those people who are barely able to pay for food and shelter simply can’t consider these other expenses.  When people are excluded within a society, when they are not well educated and when they have a higher incidence of illness, there are negative consequences for society.  We all pay the price for poverty.  The increased cost on the health system, the justice system and other systems that provide supports to those living in poverty has an impact on our economy.

While much progress has been made in measuring and analyzing poverty, the World Bank Organization is doing more work to identify indicators for the other dimensions of poverty.  This work includes identifying social indicators to track education, health, access to services, vulnerability, and social exclusion. 

There is no one cause of poverty, and the results of it are different in every case. Poverty varies considerably depending on the situation. Feeling poor in Canada is different from living in poverty in Russia or Zimbabwe.  The differences between rich and poor within the borders of a country can also be great.

Despite the many definitions, one thing is certain; poverty is a complex societal issue. No matter how poverty is defined, it can be agreed that it is an issue that requires everyone’s attention.  It is important that all members of our society work together to provide the opportunities for all our members to reach their full potential. It helps all of us to help one another .

CAUSES OF POVERTY 

(1) History

Many of the poorest nations in the world were former colonies from which slaves and resources had been systematically extracted for the benefit of colonizing countries. Although there are notable exceptions (Australia, Canada and the U.S. being perhaps the most prominent), for most of these former colonies, colonialism and its legacies have helped create the conditions that prevent many people from accessing land, capital, education and other resources that allow people to support themselves adequately. In these nations, poverty is one legacy of a troubled history involving conquest.

(2) War & political instability

Whatever the causes of war and political upheaval, it is clear that safety, stability and security are essential for subsistence and, beyond that, economic prosperity and growth. Without these basics, natural resources cannot be harnessed individually or collectively, and no amount of education, talent or technological know-how will allow people to work and reap the benefits of their labor. Laws are needed to protect rights, property and investments, and without legal protections, farmers, would-be entrepreneurs and business owners cannot safely invest in a country’s economy. It is a telling sign that the poorest countries in the world have all experienced civil war and serious political upheaval at some point in the 20th century, and many of them have weak governments that cannot or do not protect people against violence.

(3) National Debt

Many poor countries carry significant debt due to loans from wealthier nations and international financial institutions. Poorer nations owe an average of $2.30 in debt for every $1 received in grant aid. In addition, structural adjustment policies by organizations like the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund often require poorer nations to open their markets to outside business and investors, thereby increasing competition with local businesses and, many argue, undermining the potential development of local economies. In recent years, calls for debt reduction and forgiveness have been increasing, as activists see this as a key means of reducing poverty. The United Nations has also made it a priority to examine how economic structural adjustment policies can be designed to place less pressure on vulnerable populations.

(4) Discrimination and social inequality

Poverty and inequality are two different things, but inequality can feed widespread poverty by barring groups with lower social status from accessing the tools and resources to support themselves. According to the United Nations Social Policy and Development Division, “inequalities in income distribution and access to productive resources, basic social services, opportunities, markets, and information have been on the rise worldwide, often causing and exacerbating poverty.” The U.N. and many aid groups also point out that gender discrimination has been a significant factor in holding many women and children around the world in poverty.

(5) Vulnerability to natural disasters

In regions of the world that are already less wealthy, recurrent or occasional catastrophic natural disasters can pose a significant obstacle to eradicating poverty. The effects of flooding in Bangladesh, drought in the Horn of Africa and the 2005 earthquake in Haiti are examples of the ways in which vulnerability to natural disasters can be devastating to affected countries. In each of these cases, already impoverished people became refugees within their own countries, losing whatever little they had, being forced out of their living spaces and becoming almost completely dependent on others for survival. According to the World Bank, two years after Cyclone Nargis hit Myanmar in 2008, the debt burden of local fishermen had doubled. The Solomon Islands experienced an earthquake and tsunami in 2007 and the losses from that disaster equaled 95 percent of the national budget. Without foreign aid, governments in these countries would have been unable to meet the needs of their people.

EFFECTS OF POVERTY

Poverty results in many things that can affect human population negatively or worsen certain situations. The effects or consequences of poverty are as follow:

1. Poor health
2. Poor or no education
3. Death
4. Child Abuse
5. Crime

(1) Poor health:

Where will a poor person see the money to go for medical check-up frequently to know the state of his or her health? You go for medical check-up regularly when you have the money to pay the doctor that will conduct the test on your body. Generally, poverty encourages poor health. One may have an interest in taking fruits so that the body system will be immune against disease but will not be able to do that if there is no enough money to get the fruit for his consumption.

Many children suffer from one disease to another because of the high poverty level in the vicinity. Malnutrition is high in many poor countries of the world and it is one of the consequences of early child death. Child mortality is a problem and one of the ways to limit it is by eradication of poverty.

(2) Poor or no Education:

Truly, a poor does not go to school. Where will he get the money to get educated? The truth is that it is how the disease will be transferred from father to children until the bondage of poverty is broken in the hand of any of the children or the generation. Where will the money for expensive textbooks and materials for practical functions come from? It is when a student has money that he will think of textbooks to buy for his or her study.

Parents who are poor do not have money to send their children to school because of the problem of poverty. The parents first use the available money to buy food for the family before you think of primary or secondary school enrollment. In most African countries, there is poor enrollment of citizens of different nations because of the high level of poverty.

(3) Death:

 Poverty can lead people to death. As people say that poverty is a disease, when the disease is not cured on time, it can kill the person that is suffering from it. Bringing it down to the human life, poverty leads people to starvation which later leads to their death.

The life expectancy of rich countries of the world are not the same with that of poor countries of the world. That of rich countries is higher than that of poorer countries because the rich have the money to take care of themselves, while the poorer have little or nothing. The life expectancy of Liberia in 2009 was 55.48 years (World Bank Data). Liberia is the world’s 4th poorest nation based on 2013 poverty report. From the data of the life expectancy, it implies that that average Liberians die at the age of 55.48 years. So, poverty can be the cause of early death in the country when compared with that of rich countries. Nigeria, which is another country located in African continent has the life expectancy of 50.9 years (2009 report) and can be traced to the poverty level in the country. In 2013, the country was 44th poorest country in the world. The United States of America has high life expectancy. This is because of the good economic environment, and low poverty level. The life expectancy of United States of America (USA) is 78.2 years (2009 World Bank Report). Owing to that, USA is the 4th richest country in the world (International Monetary Fund Report in 2013). In conclusion, as poverty level of countries increase, the death rate may increase.

(4) Child Abuse:

Child abuse simply mean physical maltreatment of the child by people of higher ages. Because of child abuse, governments and some individuals are working hard to ensure that children are not maltreated in any way.

But, poverty is one of the major causes of child abuse. Some parents expose their children to danger in the course of making effort to see that both ends meet. For instance, parents who are poor send their children to roads where the hawk for goods and can accidentally be knocked down by vehicles, which most of them die at that spot. Some of them carry sachet water and sell to travelers on express roads. During these functions performed by the poor children, the young female gender among them may fall into the hands of hungry men who seriously “enter” into the inner parts of their body, found in-between the legs, and seriously injure the poor girls in the process of forcing in their “things” into that of the girls.

(5) Crime:

 According to Concise Oxford English Dictionary, crime is an action which constitutes a serious offense against an individual or the state and is punishable by Law. Poverty brings about corruption in countries. Poverty can force people to indulge in criminal acts. Because there is no money, people forced themselves to make money through cut-corners.

The armed robbers that operate on different highways do not operate because they do not love their lives; rather conditions of poverty can force them into that. When one is poor, a lot of evil thoughts can flow into him and subsequently leads him into robbery, which can end his existence in this life. Most people take the risk of robbery because they seriously believe that it is what will make them come out of the dungeon of poverty.

SOLUTION TO POVERTY

(1) Employment generation

Carefully and extensively planned employment programs funded by the government can spur growth in jobs. Industries requiring substantial labour forces can also be given significantly larger aid from the government. Focus should be placed on developing companies that offer sustainable and long-term jobs to the community. Companies should also budget sufficiently for employee training and related community programs, so that employees and prospective employees can keep their skills relevant and up-to-date.

Drawing on various social institutions to fund poverty fighting programs e.g. charities, research institutions, U.N. , non-profit organizations, universities.

Money funneled from every organization available adds up to powerful sums that can produce tangible change. When organizations develop an interest, albeit vested, they tend to be more strongly motivated. Organizations that have a concrete goal to achieve with strict project plans are able to efficiently concentrate their efforts into producing change. For this reason charities with numerous middlemen organizations should be discouraged to ensure money reaches those in need. Importance should be given to organizations that follow the teach a man to fish ideology rather than the give the man a fish one, unless in extremely dire emergency circumstances.

(2) Transparency in government spending

Where and how a government chooses to spend taxpayers’ money and its own revenue should be visible to the media and the common man. This makes governments accountable for their actions and inaction becomes easier to pinpoint and address. It also discourages corruption in government systems. For example, transparency will be especially beneficial to civilians whose government might be allotting money to its nuclear weapons program instead of to its poverty programs.

(3) Cancelling impossible to repay world debts

Many developing countries are trapped in the cycle of constantly repaying debts that are impossible to pay off. This ensures that they never get a chance to develop and become self-sufficient. The priorities of these countries are therefore unnecessarily skewed and the citizens of these debt-ridden nations are devoid of any hope for a better future.

(4) Prioritizing programs that target fundamental human rights

Every individual should have access to housing, food, clean water, healthcare and electricity. Technically governments should only move on to other projects after they have made sure that programs that provide these basic amenities to their people are up and running. This might prove to be the hardest step yet.