The real solution is to make the parents productive enough so that they can produce enough for themselves — and for their children. What these poor people in India and the like need, are not more humanitarians like Mother Theresa, but more businessman like Bill Gates. What these countries need is not more government controls, but more freedom.
Tag Archives | poverty
What about those who cannot afford to pay for their education?
As for those select few who cannot afford to pay for their own education they can resort to private charity, which will be greatly enlarged through the use of tax credits. School vouchers is another “mixed economy” option, depending upon how it is implemented. Also, under capitalism, since their would be no public schools, more private schools would appear, which would lead to more competition, and a decrease in the cost of an education.
Isn’t the solution to low wages minimum wage laws?
If passing minimum wage laws are the secret to raising wages, then why doesn’t the government make everybody rich by setting the wage to a million dollars? Would this solve poverty in third world countries, or would this make everyone — who produces less then the million dollar minimum wage — unemployable? The truth is that those who don’t produce enough to merit the minimum wage will become unemployed by such laws, and those who do produce more then the minimum wage don’t need such laws. If a laborer — say Michael Jordan — is not paid enough for what he produces, then someone else will hire him an pay him more. It is competition for labor — that produces — that pushes wages up.
What about the poor under capitalism?
The other side of that question is: what about those who are not poor?
What of them? Let us not forget that the “rich” are people too, and they also have the right to their life, their right to liberty, and their right to their property, and their right to pursue happiness.
Is the fact that one is poor, a justification to rob the rich?
That a man does not have riches and another does, is no excuse for the first to rob the latter — neither is it a moral justification for the state to rob the first for the benefit of the latter.
What is welfare?
Welfare — the extortion of wealth from those who produce by the “humanitarians” in government, to be distributed to those who consume (but do not produce), is to render the producers slaves and the “humanitarians” thieves. Whether the thief is wearing a ski mask, or is a dressed in a pinstripe suit with the letters IRS labeled on it, does not change the nature of their actions in principle: both are looters as both are initiators of force. With one exception, the man wearing the ski mask is more honest: he is not a big enough hypocrite to tell the citizen that he is robbing him of his hard earned wealth “for his own good”, or even worse “for the good of the people.”
What of the poor under capitalism?
As for poverty, under capitalism, no poor man is prohibited from creating a fortune — observe that in late 19th century and early twentieth century America how hundreds of really “poor” immigrants, who could not even speak a word of English, came to America and within a generation were America’s newest elite — and they did it without the government on their backs, or on the backs of others. Even today, in semi-free America, many such immigrants come here starting with nothing and create fortunes — though this is a rarer occurrence due to the vast weight of the volumes of incoherent and irrational regulations that punish those who have an urgent need to accumulate capital (the poor).
Your question accepts the collectivist premise that wealth is a static quantity owned by that amorphous super-organism the “collective” to be looted from those individuals who create it. The “poor” don’t need government handouts — they need government off their backs and most importantly off the backs of those who can really help them — the “rich.”
Who is the poor man better off under: Mother Teresa or Bill Gates?
A Mother Teresa who hands them bowls of slop every day, so they can barely exist — or a genius like Bill Gates who creates a fortune for himself by helping others to create fortunes for themselves, i.e., “where the first feeds them for a day, the second helps them feed themselves.” Observe that it is the Bill Gates of the world who are not allowed to exist in India — and the Mother Teresas who are.
What do you mean by “rich”?
Now when I mean “rich”, I do not mean those scabs who gained their fortunes by political pull, by having government grant them favors and franchises at the expense of their fellow-men. When I mean “rich” I refer to businessmen who who achieved their fortunes by economic means — through production and trade.
What is the cause of mass poverty?
To answer the question, “What about the poor under capitalism?” one must first answer, “Why are there poor people in the first place?” The source of all poverty is the lack of wealth, which must be produced. The source of production (and thus wealth) is man’s mind, which politically has only one requirement: freedom. Politically, this is the single cause of mass poverty: the lack of freedom. Observe the poorest countries are those where capitalism is lacking.
