The nature of poverty: why can't we get rid of poverty

The two authors discuss in this book: Why do poor people have to buy TV when they are not hungry? Why do their children not like learning even if they study? Why do they have to spend their money on medicine instead of enjoying their free and healthy lives? Why can they start a business but it's hard to Yeh? Why do most people think that microfinance and poor banks have no effect? Since 15, in order to find out why poverty, poverty can lead to specific problems, and thus constantly let the poor fall into the "poverty trap" cycle, "The nature of poverty," two of the authors of the five continents in many countries of the poor world, the poorest people to investigate the most ...

The following is a book written by Douban, named "Icarus":

Characteristics of the poor

Since the emergence of poverty, we have had some kind of conventional way of degrading the poor. They are sometimes described as lazy, sometimes motivated, sometimes noble, sometimes sneaky, sometimes angry, sometimes submissive, sometimes helpless, sometimes self-improvement. In essence, these perceptions of them do not help the ordinary men and women in poverty to achieve hope, dispel doubt, make up for deficiencies, satisfy desires, believe firmly, and solve puzzles. The appearance of the poor is usually just as the owner of some kind of inspirational drama or tragedy, or an admirable, or compassionate, rather than a disseminator of knowledge, and people will not consult them about their ideas or plans.

The plight of the poor seems to be the same for many others-a lack of information, conviction, procrastination. Indeed, we are not poor, well-educated and well-informed, but the difference between us and the poor is actually very small, because we know much less than we think. Our real advantage is that a lot of things we unconsciously get. We do not have to worry about whether we are going to have a survival problem tomorrow, in other words, we need not have our own limited self-control and decisiveness, and the poor have to keep using that ability.

It must be clear, however, that even if these people are in poverty, they have the opportunity to be like us in all respects. The poor have the same desires and weaknesses that we have, and not how much we are rational--on the contrary, precisely because they have almost nothing, we often find that the poor are cautious in making their choices: they need to be prudent economists to survive.

However, there is still a world of difference between us and their lives. This is largely because we are so accustomed to all aspects of our lives that we hardly contemplate them. The meager income each day means to them that they will be limited in their access to information--everything will have to be paid for. So they often know nothing about the specific information that other people in the world are getting. So, in the world they live in, many institutions are not built for people like them. Most poor people do not have a stable source of income, let alone a voluntary retirement scheme.  This is equivalent to, you do not know in large characters, but according to a lot of rules to make a decision. All this suggests that for the poor, to give full play to their talents and to provide security for the future of their families, they need more skills, more willpower and more commitment. On the contrary, however, it is the small chemical fertilizers, the small obstacles, the small mistakes that most of us overlook that have become particularly problematic in the lives of the poor. In addition, one of the reasons that poverty traps may not exist is that most people are fed, absolute food deprivation does not exist, and poor people are malnourished because they are primarily concerned not with the price, nor the nutritional value, but the taste of the food. The less money in hand, the less willing to buy healthy food. Especially when you're in a state of unemployment, you don't want to eat dull healthy foods, you want to eat something that tastes good, and there's always some cheap and tasty food to tempt them.

So, our eyes of the poor world, is often a loss of opportunity land. The poor tend to question those imaginary opportunities and doubt the possibility of any radical change in their lives. Their actions often reflect the idea that any change that is worth making will take a long time. This also explains why they focus on the present, make the best of the day and participate in the celebrations where necessary.

The problem of learning has never been placed in a prominent position, and in many people's eyes, what is learned is more important than not being in school. But if you don't learn anything at school, school is really useless for kids. The market does not play its part, and the lack of competitive pressure among private schools does not give parents enough guidance. But beyond that, attention needs to be paid to a key issue peculiar to education, where every stage of education is valuable, but specific expectations of educational outcomes distort the needs of parents, including the value of public and private schools, the achievements of children, and the attendant waste.

Because self-control is hard to achieve, conscious policymakers take other actions to reduce their chances of being tempted in the future. But the rich will save more on the current net worth because today's deposits are part of the net worth of tomorrow's capital. And for the poor, unless they are able to act according to the power and the rules, to narrow the distance with the target, otherwise everything will be very far for them.

The plight of the poor

In the absence of traditional employment opportunities, a special career impulse was more revealed, so the poor people's career sue is to buy a job: their own small business, or to the system. Especially for the work of the Government the special emphasis on the surface of the poor to the stability of a yearning, so that they have to give up the excitement of life. However, in the face of the "government is not dependant" era, they can really be reliable.

For people, it may be necessary to drink a sense of stability when looking at a problem in a long-term perspective. As for those who do not see their future quality of life improving, they may be unwilling to continue their efforts and their living standards will be difficult to improve. A solid income can make a bigger contribution to future spending and make it easier and cheaper to borrow now. That's why a job is so important. A good job is a steady, paid job that gives people enough mental space to do what the middle class is good at.

Addition：

The poor refuse to plan and hate planning, because they don't believe what the effects of these things will be. Their first choice will always be: to make their lives a little bit less boring.

Poor people tend to spend their money on expensive medical care, not on cheap prevention.

All the ways in which the poor deal with risk are generally expensive.

......

How to get rid of poverty?

Getting out of poverty is not easy, but with a "everything is possible" attitude, adding a bit of aid (a message, a little push) can sometimes produce unexpected results. On the other hand, misplaced expectations, the lack of necessary beliefs, and some minor obstacles on the surface may cause some damage to the process. It is important to hold the right levers, but the right levers are often hard to find. Moreover, a single lever clearly does not solve all the problems. At the same time, the really useful presumptuous is to think from the point of view of the actual problem, so that we can find a specific way to solve the problem, rather than talking about foreign aid.

There is no best way out of poverty. On the one hand, the answer to a question depends on what you call "effect". On the other hand, the best enemy is often better. And even if we have an objective and sober understanding of the problem, we must realize that the problem does not necessarily mean that these problems can be solved. This may simply mean that we can meet setbacks in our own way. We cannot rely solely on the system, the most basic concept of the system: the system stipulates the rules of participation. This concept includes most of the concepts in previous analyses; nor can we rely solely on the control of consumption and income, which, while sensitive to price, is not sensitive to income, and we cannot rely solely on policies, which, if not properly implemented, are properly planned and not functioning. Unfortunately, there is a growing gap between the intentions and the implementation of the policy.

To make breakthroughs in the world's most important problems, it seems self-evident that you must accumulate, think, experiment, and execute it carefully. But in reality, this is not the usual way of making policy, and the implementation of development policies and the ensuing controversy seem to be premised on evidence: evidence that can be proved is a delusion, at best a distant dream, or an amusement. Policymakers and stubborn advisers are more likely to pursue research than to seek evidence. But, no matter what, this kind of haste has no benefit, unreasonable.

Article/Icarus