Poverty Around the World

Around the world, in rich or poor nations, poverty has always been present.

In most nations today, inequality—the gap between the rich and the poor—is quite high and often widening.

The causes are numerous, including a lack of individual responsibility, bad government policy, exploitation by people and businesses with power and influence, or some combination of these and other factors.

Many feel that high levels of inequality will affect social cohesion and lead to problems such as increasing crime and violence.

Inequality is often a measure of relative poverty. Absolute poverty, however, is also a concern. World Bank figures for world poverty reveals a higher number of people live in poverty than previously thought.

What is Poverty? How does poverty affects one's life and environment? How can we solve this kind of problem? As I have read the article, that were some of the questions formulated on my mind. First and foremost to understand such problem, I should give you a little definition of what poverty is.

 Poverty is the state or condition of having little money or no money, goods, or means of support; condition of being poor. 

            

                                                                                                                                                     

Exactly like the children in the picture. That is poverty. I am really bothered if I can see people like this. Why there are people like them? Who were responsible of these people? What are the effects of poverty?

As far as I know, people or should I say poor people do exist because of inequality. Rich people becomes richer and poor people becomes poorer. Many people says: "Life is unfair", but I am not convinced about this. Life isn't unfair. People are the one who were making it unfair. If we just know how to treat people equally as God treating us, maybe poverty isn't present in the world. As the article states, yes, government has a very great impact on people's lives. More often, it is the officials seated who were responsible of those people suffering from poverty. I know their jobs weren't that easy, but because they have chosen to be in that position, they should be willing also to take risk and to be a good leader as well as to be a fair and a person for others. Sometimes the effects of poverty may also be its causes. 

Here are some of the effects of poverty:

                                                                            HEALTH  

                                                

One third of deaths are due to poverty-related causes. Hunger and malnutrition are the single gravest threats to the world's public health.

                          
                      EDUCATION

Research has found that there is a high risk of educational underachievement for children who are from low-income housing circumstances. This often is a process that begins in primary school for some less fortunate children.     


HOUSING

      

Poverty increases the  homelessness. Slum-dwellers, who make up a third of the world's urban population, live in a poverty no better, if not worse, than rural people, who are the traditional focus of the poverty in the developing world according to a report by the United Nations. There are over 100 million street children worldwide.

                                                                      
           
                                   
                                                                          VIOLENCE

                                                 

According to experts, many women become victims of trafficking, the most common form of which is prostitution, as a means of survival and economic desperation. Deterioration of living conditions can often compel children to abandon school in order to contribute to the family income, putting them at risk of being exploited.

Nobody knows when this poverty would end. If only each one of us would know how to treat others fairly, and to think for them. Though I nor you can't stop this kind of problem, at least, together, we can lessen the problem.

LIPSTICK EFFECT

Economics has many categories for “goods”. “Luxury Goods” are items that people buy more of as their income rises, as opposed to “Necessity Goods” like food and shelter, whose demand is unrelated to income. Examples of luxury goods include fine jewelry, expensive sports cars and designer clothing. The Lipstick Effect is the theory that during an economic calamity, people buy more less costly luxury goods. Instead of buying a fur coat, people will buy expensive lipstick. The idea is that people buy luxury goods even during economic hardships, they will just choose goods that have less of an impact on their funds. Other less expensive luxury goods besides cosmetics include expensive beer and small gadgets.

Today is different from yesterday. And what will happen today will merely affect our future. Life is constantly changing. But why is that nowadays, we value more of the material things that were not really important? The Lipstick effect wants to tell us that we are now setting aside the more valuable things in life. It is alright to have luxuries but setting aside important things than these things weren't good. For example, you have a good income because of your position in a company, yet you choose to buy things like gadgets and cosmetics instead of food and necessary things. Don't you think that it will last for a lifetime? Of course no, we should always think beyond. What we have today doesn't mean that we'll still have it tomorrow. At least if we buy food, we will surely be full. 

"Wow. She's very rich. I wish I have that things too" .. That's what all of us would probably think if we saw someone having these kinds of gadgets. 

But when you see people like this,

How would you react? 

These people lack food to eat and don't have the shelter to stay on. I would rather choose not to see people like these than to see people having their gadgets. I hope that everyone have the same decision as I have. If only I have all the riches, I will help them rather than buying things that were not important. Come to think about it.

If we also think of the other people's needs than buying unnecessary things for ourselves, even though problems rises, then everybody would be happy. 

Life will be worth living.