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The True Cause of Poverty


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2014 Sep 4, 12:33pm   48,174 views  297 comments

by Peter P   ➕follow (2)   💰tip   ignore  

Poverty exists because of bad values. It is that simple. The majority of poor people think wealth is a sin. It is not surprising their moral high ground is a swamp.

It is all too human to find comfort in blame. As a result, the goal to lift oneself out of poverty is entirely forgotten. On the other hand, winners do not waste time with excuses.

Do you want to succeed? Or would you like to have the most beautiful, heart-wrenching story of your failure.

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1   epitaph   2014 Sep 4, 1:00pm  

Laziness divided by opportunity = cannot divide by zero.

2   Peter P   2014 Sep 4, 1:03pm  

Laziness may or may not have anything to do with it. Many rich people are lazy too. But rich people certainly do not hate success.

3   Strategist   2014 Sep 4, 1:08pm  

Peter P says

Poverty exists because of bad values.

I thought poverty was due to lack of money.

4   Peter P   2014 Sep 4, 1:09pm  

Strategist says

Peter P says

Poverty exists because of bad values.

I thought poverty was due to lack of money.

That's like saying Feminism was due to lack of dicks. ;-)

5   Ceffer   2014 Sep 4, 1:12pm  

Peter P says

That's like saying Feminism was due to lack of dicks. ;-)

I thought it was due to women who WERE dicks.

6   Peter P   2014 Sep 4, 1:16pm  

Ceffer says

Peter P says

That's like saying Feminism was due to lack of dicks. ;-)

I thought it was due to women who WERE dicks.

Isn't it ironic?

7   MisdemeanorRebel   2014 Sep 4, 1:18pm  

Peter P says

It is all too human to find comfort in blame. As a result, the goal to lift oneself out of poverty is entirely forgotten. On the other hand, winners do not waste time with excuses.

It's also all to human to blame others' misfortune on themselves, to be selfish and inconsiderate once one is "above" the struggle to make a living, etc.

Justifying the rich and powerful is the oldest philosophical endeavour known to man.

What did the Walton heirs do to merit their inherited wealth?

8   Strategist   2014 Sep 4, 1:19pm  

Peter P says

Strategist says

Peter P says

Poverty exists because of bad values.

I thought poverty was due to lack of money.

That's like saying Feminism was due to lack of dicks. ;-)

That's the funniest thing I have ever heard.
I guess being a man is due to lack of a vagina. What a relief. Who needs the plumbing problems.

9   Peter P   2014 Sep 4, 1:25pm  

thunderlips11 says

Justifying the rich and powerful is the oldest philosophical endeavour known to man.

No, but perhaps it is time for everybody to stop justifying and start creating wealth.

10   Peter P   2014 Sep 4, 1:27pm  

thunderlips11 says

What did the Walton heirs do to merit their inherited wealth?

Meritocracy is as overrated as reason. Who is there to decide merit anyway?

The Walton could inherit their wealth because the original wealth creator said so.

11   MisdemeanorRebel   2014 Sep 4, 1:29pm  

What's the endgame? If everybody is wealthy, who collects the trash, serves the burgers, and changes the adult diapers?

Plenty of people living in a Thailand landfill working their asses off to find enough garbage to salvage or eat. 14 hours a day, 7 days a week, year after year. Should they start GarbageUber to find the best scrap yards?

12   Peter P   2014 Sep 4, 1:31pm  

thunderlips11 says

What's the endgame? If everybody is wealthy, who collects the trash, serves the burgers, and changes the adult diapers?

Robots.

thunderlips11 says

Plenty of people living in a Thailand landfill working their asses off to find enough garbage to salvage or eat. 14 hours a day, 7 days a week, year after year. Should they start GarbageUber to find the best scrap yards?

They should certainly try. Working harder will not guarantee success.

13   Peter P   2014 Sep 4, 1:37pm  

Strategist says

That's the funniest thing I have ever heard.

I guess being a man is due to lack of a vagina. What a relief. Who needs the plumbing problems.

Thanks! PatNet is a great place to test comedy writing.

Don't forget penis has a hole too. Just harder to clean.

14   Peter P   2014 Sep 4, 1:42pm  

jazz music says

The business classes are very class-conscious

Though one time the stewardess was kind enough to let me use the business-class loo.

15   Strategist   2014 Sep 4, 1:47pm  

Peter P says

jazz music says

The business classes are very class-conscious

Though one time the stewardess was kind enough to let me use the business-class loo.

Flight attendants, Peter, flight attendants.
Jazz thinks wealth just exists and anyone who has more must have stolen it.

16   Peter P   2014 Sep 4, 1:58pm  

jazz music says

We all devote our lives to creating wealth ... for some angry lazy rich fuckup to own.

Or you can try to "own" the wealth. The majority of Forbes 400 are self-made.

17   Strategist   2014 Sep 4, 1:58pm  

jazz music says

Peter P says

creating wealth.

We all devote our lives to creating wealth ... for some angry lazy rich fuckup to own. Or we face getting beaten to death on the streets, where the police thugs roam seeking federal grant money for the local court system and to get overtime pay by getting some poor sucker into court where police hang out, sleep, socialize, whatever.

When we become old, injured, disabled and otherwise unable to serve that end we disappear into obscurity hopefully on someone's couch or basement. "So and so got laid off, whatever happened to him? I heard he had some medical expenses, I dunno, hmmm ... the boss sure likes the intern they brought in."

You need help. Someone, please call 911.

18   indigenous   2014 Sep 4, 2:05pm  

It would help if the government quit training people to be victims...

10 million people now on permanent disability.

19   Strategist   2014 Sep 4, 2:08pm  

indigenous says

It would help if the government quit training people to be victims...

10 million people now on permanent disability.

Just cut off their benefits and see how quickly they recover.

20   indigenous   2014 Sep 4, 2:09pm  

Strategist says

Just cut off their benefits and see how quickly they recover.

Sactly

21   Strategist   2014 Sep 4, 2:26pm  

indigenous says

Strategist says

Just cut off their benefits and see how quickly they recover.

Sactly

Once I slightly bumped into a van at a traffic light. The driver comes out with his right hand behind him going back and forth. I go to the back of the car and get a video camera (It was in Hawaii before the iphone era) and start recording the bumpers which had zero damage. Suddenly he was just fine. he he he he. What a miracle.

22   MisdemeanorRebel   2014 Sep 4, 2:41pm  

Peter P says

Robots.

That assumes cheap energy. And robots can't replace most minimal wage workers, since they don't spend all their time flipping burgers (but getting more bread rolls, wrapping sandwiches, sweeping the floor, counting cups, etc.)

Also, terrible for societal order. If you have no skin in the game, why bother?

Immense pressure evens out society somewhat. Rich people cowed into concessions to maintain social order. Incredible prosperity as the wealth creators are actually paid a large portion of the wealth they create. The Richy Rich's grandchildren who don't remember the upheaval so the cycle repeats again as they fund scholars for dollars and progandizing plutocrat-friendly philosphers. Public forgets what it was like in grandad's day when there was little work at shitty pay. And the cycle repeats.

But I'm actually pretty optimistic. The best places in the world are Social Democracies, not Laissez-Faire Capitalist Oligarchies. There are more and more educated people, and the "I gotta prove I'm as tough as my WW2 Vet and Depression Surviving Dad by being a Self-Centered Asshole" Babyboomer types are not long for the earth.

The world is getting smaller and more and more Americans realize that Swedes and Germans don't live in rat-infested tenements lit only by a single bulb in a bare outlet and only get a band aid if they get sick. They're astonished to find people in Belgium getting a living wage to work at McD's. That people don't lose their homes over a bout of breast cancer.

23   Peter P   2014 Sep 4, 2:57pm  

Jazz, it is unfortunate you feel that wealth accumulation is immoral. But you just further highlighted my points on this thread.

24   indigenous   2014 Sep 4, 2:59pm  

thunderlips11 says

The best places in the world are Social Democracies, not Laissez-Faire Capitalist Oligarchies.

That is more myth than reality, though they appear real.

25   Peter P   2014 Sep 4, 3:21pm  

Europeans do not enjoy nearly the same kind of social mobility. If you aspire to be a career burger-flipper, perhaps this is the wrong place. However, if you want to build something great, there are few places on earth with the same opportunities. Carly Fiorina used to be a secretary.

I have a few German and Czech friends. They came here because the market is freer.

26   Peter P   2014 Sep 4, 3:37pm  

It is well accepted that arbitrage removes inefficiency in a market. Some may call it exploitation or betrayal but taking advantage of an economic reality is frequently the best way to improve it. This opportunistic spirit will drive us forward.

27   anonymous   2014 Sep 4, 3:38pm  

If you believe in evolution, then you must believe in survival of the fittest. Propping up the weak is not natural and only weakens the human race. In order for humans to flourish, we must allow evolutionary forces to work which likely means the strong will rule and the weak will either serve the strong or perish. It's as simple as that.

28   marcus   2014 Sep 4, 3:38pm  

Peter P says

Poverty exists because of bad values. It is that simple.

Just out of curiosity, if everyone had the right values, just how wealthy could EVERYONE be ? I'm not kidding.

Could everyone own their own jet plane and their own island ? OR whatever material things they desire ?

Or is it that there would then have to be some new super duper improved values and attitude that separated the winners from the plain old "good values" losers ?

Who would do the slave labor ?

29   Peter P   2014 Sep 4, 3:41pm  

jazz music says

I met some Germans at a party that laughed like hell when we elected Schwarzenegger.

They explained that once they elected an Austrian and things didn't go too well for them.

Germans do have their own brand of humor. :-)

But Austrians remind me of The Sound of Music. So happy.

jazz music says

They also said where is the freedom here when you can't even go to a park or a beach and have a beer?

There are beer gardens here.

30   Peter P   2014 Sep 4, 3:44pm  

marcus says

Just out of curiosity, if everyone had the right values, just how wealthy could EVERYONE be ? I'm not kidding.

Right or wrong is relative. Your mileage may vary.

31   Heraclitusstudent   2014 Sep 4, 3:44pm  

Peter P says

Europeans do not enjoy nearly the same kind of social mobility.

On the contrary, Europeans have higher social mobility.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/05/us/harder-for-americans-to-rise-from-lower-rungs.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

32   marcus   2014 Sep 4, 3:48pm  

Peter P says

Right or wrong is relative

Copout. You can't even see how naive and illogical your nonsense is.

You're right that there are dysfunctional people, and people who play the victim, and there are lazy people. And these characteristics will likely contribute to these individual people being way poorer than they would otherwise be under our system.

But are these character flaws or whatever you want to call them the reason for poverty ?

Hell no. That's about as true as saying that many poor people are poor because they aren't narcissistic or psychopathic enough.

Only a complete idiot would make the claim you do above. I hope you're just trolling, and aren't really that stupid.

33   Heraclitusstudent   2014 Sep 4, 3:49pm  

Peter P says

Poverty exists because of bad values. It is that simple.

I think unfortunately you give the poor too much credit.

A lot of them are probably poor because of their low IQs.

But you can blame people for bad values but not for being dumb.

34   Peter P   2014 Sep 4, 3:49pm  

debyne says

Propping up the weak is not natural and only weakens the human race.

God is dead.
-- Friedrich Nietzsche

Maybe not quite... but God is a Darwinist... otherwise there will be pandas everywhere.

35   Peter P   2014 Sep 4, 3:54pm  

Heraclitusstudent says

On the contrary, Europeans have higher social mobility.

Nah. A better measure would be the number of billionaires who were born in working-class or middle-class families.

Heraclitusstudent says

A lot of them are probably poor because of their low IQs.

Intelligence is a measure invented by sell-proclaimed "intelligent" people to make themselves feel better.

You don't need to be a genius to make it. In fact, most "smart" people I know have serious social handicaps.

36   Peter P   2014 Sep 4, 3:56pm  

marcus says

That's about as true as saying that many poor people are poor because they aren't narcissistic or psychopathic enough.

That's just another way to say that wealth is a sin (or a mental illness).

37   Peter P   2014 Sep 4, 4:14pm  

If Europeans have higher social mobility, where are their Larry Page and Larry Ellison?

UK has Richard Branson and James Dyson, but the kingdom is not exactly in continental Europe and it has a different philosophy.

Why are people obsessed with low-order statistics like averages? Excellence is best measured by the fat-tail.

38   zzyzzx   2014 Sep 4, 11:22pm  

I blame blacks, since most of them are too fucking lazy to get a job.

39   anonymous   2014 Sep 4, 11:49pm  

zzyzzx says

I blame blacks, since most of them are too fucking lazy to get a job.

They need the extra time to go around nailing all our wives while we're busy at work.

40   marcus   2014 Sep 5, 12:06am  

Peter P says

marcus says

That's about as true as saying that many poor people are poor because they aren't narcissistic or psychopathic enough.

That's just another way to say that wealth is a sin (or a mental illness).

Did you miss that I was implying that it's generally false, just like your thesis above ? (but also true for many individual cases)

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