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I do not think the poor are made out to be stupid in the article, moreso it perhaps contains in it the American poverty experience: among Western countries, pov
by rue 17y ago
I do not think the poor are made out to be stupid in the article, moreso it perhaps contains in it the American poverty experience: among Western countries, poverty in the U.S. is quite unique particularly in the form of long-term predation and lack of any social support structures. Poverty in the UK is not necessarily any less entrenched, but it is still a different beast.
> If you can employ a qualified, capable worker for minimum wage (and right now, this is easy), why would you employ someone who is "poor"?
Indeed, I do not think "reasonable wages" necessarily translates to "minimum wage" which - in the U.S. and many other places - is not actually sufficient. But that statement was specifically counterpoint to the recently fashionable (and in some ways very good) microfinancing movement and other forms of entrepreneurship.
To nevertheless answer the question to convince someone espousing a liberal[1] perspective: because it creates more consumers for your products. A minimum wage job does not as a rule require highly skilled employees so that a newcomer can generally become proficient within 6 months, usually less.
[1] In the sense of the actual meaning of the word.
- potatolicious 17y ago> "counterpoint to the recently fashionable (and in some ways very good) microfinancing movement and other forms of entrepreneurship." To add to your point - I volunteer a bit with the homeless, and what I have seen from professionals involved in this field is that basic life-sustaining activities are not sufficiently accessible to the poor, which leads me to believe that microfinancing and entrepreneurship is a poor solution to the poverty problem. Below a certain income threshold, transportation becomes nearly impossible, and taking government and charitable handouts such as using the food bank is almost a full-time job. Someone at the very bottom is spending his/her entire waking hours trying to get to the next day - entrepreneurship is the last thing on their minds. The homeless in my area (Seattle) queue for up to 3 hours to receive a single meal (if they are lucky enough to get it before it runs out), and similar waits exist for the food bank, job services, social security services... the list goes on. What we need to encourage are programs and systems that will allow people to gain the bare necessities for survival - shelter, food, and security - without forcing them to commit all of their time to this task. Believe it or not, free time is the solution to the problem - one can only seek to improve one's lot when not entirely consumed with bare survival.
- hga 17y agoI may not have time to follow this discussion, but I'd like to make two points: The Soviet Union pretty explicitly followed a policy where in urban areas it took so much time to acquire food that the potential for "counter-revolutionary" thoughts and actions were minimized. Some would say in response to your free time point that "the devil finds work for idle hands". More to the point, would everyone do something good with the free time? Certainly not, but that's OK as long as there are limits on the negative externalalties (sp?) of that free time (e.g. our version of Rome's "bread and circuses" is atomizing, most people watch sports on TV, at home or perhaps in relatively small groups at sports bars, and we do a pretty good job of maintaining order in our stadiums (compare to soccer in the U.K.)).