Why am I poor? This question is being asked every day by hundreds of thousands of people on the planet. They try to buy a minimum of the things they need, but even they often lack a meager salary or pension. Poverty is a web that is difficult to break out of. But absolutely real. The main thing is to collect the will into a fist and act. Do not sit still, do not cry or put up with the sad state of things. Any changes in life give at least a chance to put an end to an unenviable social position, in contrast to complete apathy, lack of initiative and passivity.
Poverty as a social phenomenon
This is an extreme shortage of money and the resources necessary for the existence of which satisfy the urgent needs of an individual, a whole family, society and the state. For example, in the modern world, it is customary for every individual in the house to have basic things: a TV, a stove, a table, a bed, and so on. Their absence or inability to buy makes a person a pauper in the eyes of others. Of course, he still does not stand on the porch, because he earns and tries to lead a normal life. But the money that a person receives at an enterprise or plant is sorely lacking, and he can barely make ends meet.
Poverty is the insufficiency of property values, financial opportunities, goods for a full existence. If you look at a more global scale, then this is the inability to live, continue the race, develop. Extremely poor people do not even have the means to buy bread for themselves, so they go outside for begging.
Absolute poverty
This concept means the inability of a person to lead a normal lifestyle. Absolute poverty is the inability to satisfy even the basic needs of food and nutrition, clothing and warmth. Such an individual buys only the minimum of products that is capable of supporting his life. Usually he does not pay utility bills and refuses to purchase personal items. This type of poverty can be identified by comparing the cost of living and the ability to provide it with everything necessary. If the gap is very significant, then economists talk about such a thing as the poverty threshold - this is the absence of a decent way of life for society, the inability to maintain the stereotypes imposed by the era and moving away from familiar standards.
The World Bank has calculated where such a line is. According to experts, the poverty line is the existence of less than 1.25 US dollars per day. But this does not take into account households that are very slightly above this line. Therefore, a situation arises when inequality and need in the country grow, while the number of people below the poverty line decreases.
Relative poverty
Sometimes people consider themselves poor not because they are essentially missing something, but because their income is much lower than that of friends, neighbors, and relatives. Relative poverty is an indicator of how much you do not fit into the framework set by the people around you. For example, your circle of acquaintances is quite wealthy: a sister and her husband are resting in the Canary Islands, a friend goes shopping in Paris. Instead, you can spend your vacation only in the domestic Crimea. Of course, comparing yourself to your friends, you call your family poor. But if you think about it, other people cannot even afford a trip to a sanatorium outside the city, so it is unfair to consider yourself a beggar in such a situation.
In short, relative poverty is a mismatch with the standards of decent living that surrounds you. Often she tries on household incomes: if they grow, but the distribution of funds remains the same, then this type of need is a constant.
Townsend concept
He considered poverty as a condition in which the usual joys of life for a person fade into the background or become inaccessible. Due to the circumstances (job loss, lack of financial resources), he experiences hardships that change his usual way of life. For example, an entrepreneur drives to the office in his own car. But the country experienced an economic crisis, gas prices skyrocketed, and the population’s salary remained the same. Because of this, a person must abandon the car in favor of a cheaper metro ride. This does not mean that he became a beggar - rather, temporarily constrained in cash.
Townsend argues that relative poverty is income below the level at which most of society continues to be. The analyst often used the concept of multivariate deprivation in his writings, which meant the disadvantage of the individual or his family against the background of the general mass of people. It can be material, which is characterized by such indicators as clothing, food, living and working conditions, as well as social - this is the essence of employment, the level of education, ways of spending leisure time.
Two directions concept
The level of poverty is an abstract concept that does not have clear boundaries or boundaries. Therefore, the Townsend concept defines it in a narrower and broader sense. Firstly, according to the analyst, when assessing the level of need, one needs to focus on the analysis of the availability of funds for the purchase of goods for a normal life. In this case, the personal (median) income indicator that a person has is taken into account. So, in Scandinavia the threshold of relative poverty corresponds to 60% of material resources, in Europe - 50%, in the USA - 40%.
Secondly, relative poverty is being considered on a more global scale. In this case, they take into account the opportunity to fully participate in society, relying on available resources. Interestingly, absolute poverty is a deeper concept. Its range does not coincide with the relative. The first can be eliminated, the second will always be present, since inequality in society is an ineradicable and eternal phenomenon. One can speak about relative poverty even when all citizens of a country suddenly become millionaires.
Deprivation approach
It is not based on the amount of cash, resources and income, but on the level of human consumption of certain goods and services. In this case, the poverty line is a situation in society when an individual does not have access to certain things, so in the end he buys their cheaper counterparts. For example, the girl Anya wants a mobile phone. She has no money for a brand new fashionable touchscreen device, but the stock that is stored in her personal piggy bank allows her to become the owner of a fairly good button device.
The deprivation approach also implies the refusal of the population from certain services and purchases due to low incomes. Thus, a person buys less goods in a supermarket, refuses hairdressing, walks to work. Here, the basis of the level of poverty is the main emphasis on consumption. But at the same time, determining the poverty threshold is quite difficult: the population may have good financial reserves, but for some time abandon expensive goods, given the seasonality of a particular purchase.
Causes of poverty
There may be many. Sometimes people are not able to influence the circumstances that pushed them beyond the line of need. In other cases, they themselves are to blame for the circumstances. The causes of poverty can be grouped into:
- Economic - low wages, unemployment, crisis in the country, monetary devaluation.
- Political - war, forced migration.
- Socio-medical - old age, disability, high incidence in the state.
- Demographic - an incomplete family, the presence of children, dependents.
- Qualification - limited knowledge and skills, inaccessibility of education and its low level.
- Geographical - the presence of depressed regions, their uneven development.
- Personal - alcoholism, a passion for drugs, addiction to gambling.
Whatever the causes of poverty, the main thing to remember is that you can get out of a difficult situation. The one who says “Poverty is a vice” is mistaken. No, this is not worth being ashamed of. Need is a temporary phenomenon, you can always influence it with a great desire.
Poverty Explained
There are two approaches that compare poverty with a social phenomenon in society:
- Cultural explanations. Adherents of this theory say that a certain kind of behavior is forming in the society of the poor: fatalism, decline of spirit, humility, disappointment. Instead of acting, people consider themselves doomed, start to drink too much or beg. In this case, poverty is a kind of hereditary disease transmitted at the gene level. Experts advise the abolition of state benefits, pensions and benefits for such a population in order to push him to look for work and take the slightest initiative.
- Structural explanations. Based on this theory, analysts say that poverty occurs when a state experiences an economic downturn. The uneven distribution of wealth between the population during these periods is felt especially sharply. They also pay attention to changes in the structure of the international labor market. For example, a country often artificially keeps low salaries in order to attract more investment.
In addition to the above reasons, poverty can also arise due to other circumstances specific to a particular person, his way of life and the policies of the state in which he lives.
What is poverty leading to?
There are also two interesting theories, the adherents of which look at this social problem differently and offer diametrically opposite ways to eliminate it. Representatives of the first consider poverty a positive phenomenon. Analysts say that it is becoming a factor that pushes a person to action, forcing him to improve himself and his skills, to give out new ideas. As a result, society develops, works, and the economic situation of the state improves. This theory, called Darwinist, is supported by liberals.
Another course is called egalitarian. His followers believe that poverty is evil. In their view, poverty will not force a person to work more to provide himself with everything necessary. On the contrary, it will lead to the fact that he will simply gradually roll to the very bottom of society. Analysts are sure: in order to avoid the complete degradation of an individual who becomes desperate and lack of initiative due to his constraining needs, it is necessary to divide the resources and means existing in the country among all citizens as evenly as possible.
Negative consequences
The poverty level is the catalyst that determines the atmosphere in the entire state. Agree, if people suffer from poverty, tensions arise in society, and the number of crimes grows. Having dropped his hands from hopelessness, a person steals from the state, begins to illegally earn money, evades taxes, takes bribes to feed his family. Sometimes he even goes for a more serious crime: murder for profit, robbery, theft. A society suffering from poverty is often ill due to unsanitary conditions. It is characterized by a very high mortality rate and the risk of epidemics.
Hereditary poverty is especially tragic. Indeed, among beggars, gifted babies are often born who are able in the future to create a cure for cancer, invent a flying car or come up with a way to deal with global warming. But this will never happen: the lack of finances and resources leads to the fact that the child cannot get a normal education and become the new Einstein. He is also convinced from childhood that all his attempts to change his life are equal to zero, therefore he is forced to silently put up with circumstances and ruin his talents.
