I didn't catch the programme: I'd like to have seen it.
Poverty is an issue for me - personally, because I'm on benefit, and politically, because I think the way that wealth is distributed through the world is grossly unjust. That said, I'm not one of these people who watch TV all day and think that someone else's taxes should fund their cigarette and booze habit.
Broadly speaking, there are two types of poverty: absolute, and relative. I'm sure you all know this already, but I'm going to spell it out because it sometimes helps to define terms.
Absolute poverty is the lack of resources to eat properly, to drink clean fresh water, and have access to shelter, to primary education, healthcare, and adaquate sanitation. We have very little absolute poverty in the UK. World-wide, however, over a billion people scratch out meagre lives on less than a dollar a day.
Relative poverty seems to be what this program was about, and of that we have plenty. Relative poverty simply implies being less well off than your neighbour. For as long as we use the free market system to distribute value, there will always be winners and losers. It is impossible to fix relative poverty under these conditions, and may not be desirable anyway.
There have been moves to try to objectify relative poverty, by asking a random selection of the population what they think is necessary to live a reasonably dignified sort of life, but, frankly, if you have enough to eat and drink, secure lodging, clean clothing, an education of some sort and medical arrangements in place, then I tend to lose interest. There are more deserving cases, no less deserving because they inhabit a different country.
We can fix absolute poverty. This needs emphasising, because as individuals with our own families to care for, it is to easy to ask oneself - 'But what can I do?' and conclude that the answer is nothing, and that it's someone else's problem anyway.
Here's a quote to put the thing in perspective:
The UN calculates that the whole of the world population's basic needs for food, drinking water, education and medical care could be covered by a levy of less than 4% on the accumulated wealth of the 225 largest fortunes. To satisfy all the world's sanitation and food requirements would cost only $13 billion, hardly as much as the people of the United States and European Union spend each year on perfume.
Ignacio Ramonet, 'The politics of hunger'. Le Monde Diplomatique, November 1998
So, let me offer you an initiative, in which you can take part, and which won't blow your budget. It's called 'Poor Food Day' and it's being discussed under the What's Going On topic.
Here's the link
Best wishes, 2ndRateMind.
