History of Poverty

Poverty has no clear beginning. The Bible, one of the oldest books in existence, makes constant references to the poor. There has always been competition for resources (such as food or water) and as a result, an unequal sharing of “wealth.” This uneven distribution provides the basis for evolution, as those who are more apt to gather resources are more likely to survive and pass on their genes. With a system such as this in place, one would think that poverty would become practically nonexistent as the only individuals that survived were individuals with resources.

Despite this, poverty remains with us today as a major source of global problems. The World Bank defines poverty as deprivation of well-being. For the most part, poverty is thought of as hunger, lack of shelter, medication and access to education. These resources may seem like they should be a guaranteed right for every person, but people all over the world are forced to live without some/all of those essentials. In more fiscal terms, poverty can be seen as an income that falls below the international poverty line, or less than $1.25 US a day. Current estimates state that 1 in 4 people in the developing world or 1.4 billion fall below this line.

One of the biggest questions involves the role of the poor. Where do the poor belong on society’s ladder? As Zygmunt Bauman states in “Work, consumerism and the new poor”, pre-modern Europe saw the poor as innocent victims. The poor did not deserve what they had been given, but they were suffering as repentance of original sin. Therefore, care of the poor fell upon anyone with the resources to donate. Treatment of the poor was an opportunity to practice self sacrifice and to become a better person. This goes along with how many people are much more willing to aid those who are simply unfortunate than those who suffer as a result of their own poor choices.

However, that world ceased to exist as the modern era approached. Rather than focusing on the afterlife, people began to concentrate on their current lives. Your situation was a product of the choices that you or your predecessors made, and therefore the blame could be placed on no one but yourself. People became less keen on giving to the undeserving, and the poor were left to fend for themselves.

The great depression changed things slightly. Since so many people were unemployed, poverty was not your fault. Rather, it was the fault of the economy and the government. Therefore, the government created programs to support those in poverty. These programs still exist today, and the beneficial effects of the programs are unknown. It is possible that welfare programs serve to foster a sense of laziness and apathy, so that the recipients of welfare do not feel the need to get a job to rise out of poverty. Whatever may be the case, wherever humans have been, poverty has existed.

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