Essay/Term paper: Abolishing poverty in the u.s

Essay, term paper, research paper:  Philosophy Essays

Abolishing Poverty in The U.S


John Boston
Sociology 101
October 31, 1996

If I had the power to abolish poverty in the United States I would do
it in a second. Abolishing poverty would be almost impossible because there are
just to many poor people for one person to help to abolish poverty we must all
work to help those who are poor get out of this condition.

There are two types of poor, there are people who are relatively poor
and there are people who are absolutely poor. People who are relatively poor
are poor compared to the people around them. These people usually only have
the bare necessities to survive like food, clothing or shelter. They might even
have a steady job but they just don't have any real wealth. In fact people who
are relatively poor are usually in the lower 5% of the population in terms of
wealth. People who live the state of absolute poverty can not sustain a
certain level of living . These people have a hard time getting money for food ,
clothing, or shelter. People who are absolutely poor have a rough time getting
money to put food on the table one day and the next day they might not have any
money to put food on the table. Not all people who are relatively poor are
absolutely poor, but, all people who are absolutely poor are relatively poor.
These types of poor are found all throughout the world especially in
underdeveloped countries. In the United States a advanced well-developed
country both absolute and relative poverty are present throughout the country.

I think that absolute poverty has no beneficial purposes to society.
However, relative poverty does have beneficial functions. I think that relative
poverty can make people competitive. It would do this because people always try
to do better then the people around them. This competitiveness might force
people to work overtime or even two jobs in order to make more than the people
around them. There are some major costs that both poverty's have on society.
These costs include: In areas of high poverty there are usually the same areas
of high violence. A second cost to society might be that some people in
poverty might become welfare dependent, this means that they rely solely on
welfare to pay for everything and they don't even try to find a job of there
own. These negative costs definitely outweigh the benefits.

If I had control of the poverty situation in the United States I would
only try to eliminate absolute poverty. I first would raise the taxes of the
rich and the upper middle class. Then I would raise the tax on alcohol and
tobacco. Then I would do some refinancing of governments spending. With all
the money that this creates I would setup cheep but nice government housing,
government grocery stores and government clothing stores. Then I would setup a
job training program that gives poor people government jobs. I would also send
the best teachers to the ghetto schools. These programs will not work unless
the poor work to get out of there citations.

I can invasion a society without absolute poverty and without relative
poverty. In a society without absolute poverty everyone that could work would
have a job, there would be little crime just a great place to live. In a
society without relative poverty people would all have the same wealth there
would be no competition to be better then anyone. This type of society is only
possible in the imagination.