When I was a teenager I really wanted to help the poor. I did not how I thought increasing foreign aid might help the poor or working in poor areas. These things do help and are good, especially in areas of drought and total poverty that need emergency help. However, how do you end poverty fast in areas that are just chronically poor? The most efficient way to transform the lives of the poor is as follows:
How to help the poor – a real solution
Fly over a poor area with a helicopter and drop 1000s of copies of Adam Smith’s book Wealth of Nations. I am not being sarcastic or rude here. I have traveled a lot of the world and have degrees in economics and live in a post-communist/socialist country. Poor is relative. Poor people in America are rich in my mind. The poor in Poland where I live is living on less than 200 dollars a month. Few American poor live on 1000 dollars a year. During communist times there was only vinegar on the shelves, that was it. Two families would live in a one-room apartment, with people sleeping on the floor.
My friend who now owes his owns an international accounting and consulting company had to collect empty cans from the trash for his family to buy milk. There was nothing. Some people would live on basically bread. Government programs did nothing and made it worse. That is real poor, not pretend poor like in America (I am American also).
Giving people the book, Wealth of Nations will change their view on the needy and how to uplift them. I have seen it with my own eyes, how people’s lives are transformed by changing their view on economics.
People are taught that life is unfair. However, if you want to end poverty and help the needy, tell them this message of hope. Tell them what Adam Smith thought. He believed no matter what, every person rich or poor has the ability to give in their own unique way to the economy. Poverty and being poor is a state of mind.
Charitable giving goes up the freer a society is, the more socialistic there is less charity.
Here are some resources to help mental poverty and aid the poor
- I wrote an article on why the rich have money. Understand that there are two types of capital, financial capital, and intellectual capital. Intellectual capital will always pay more. Everyone has this and can generate money for themselves and their family and end financial problems for themselves.
- If you do not like my capitalist view on aid or assistance to the poor, try this book. Small is beautiful – a study of economics as if people mattered by E. F. Schumacher. It is a very liberal almost socialist view but basically says the same things. It says that each person matters and can contribute to the world and should not wait for some big corporation to rescue them by giving them a job. Think of the movie Gandhi and what he recommended.
- Read An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations
- Adam Smith’s philosophy on the poor and rich
The best way you personally help is to donate to a respected organization like the Red Cross or any charity you prefer or check out www.charitynavigator.org is a good start.
Let me know your thoughts and ideas. This is a very general and not specific argument I have about the poor and how they can be helped. What do you think of my idea about dropping Adam Smith’s work by helicopter to end poverty now?
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