[Aryan_]

Originally Posted by ChotooMotoo

How do you define absolute poverty then?

Maybe in Brittian there is a system for the poor to pull themselves up, but there really isn't in America. You see one or two isolated examples of people getting ahead, but they are few and far between, and often involve aquiring tremendous amounts of debt. Education is considered the best way to "get ahead" but if you are really poor, even with scholarships and everything, you could end up taking out $50,000 in student loans just for your B.S. degree. That means that unless you get an incredibly well paying job you really won't be that much better off than a very industrious construction worker with no student loans. In the USA we have this attitude of blame the poor. If someone had kids out of wedlock, they deserve to suffer, and so do their kids. It's a vicious cycle. The USA has a really feudalistic 3rd world mindset when it comes to social welfare.

Just look at the kinds of immigrants that come to the USA: mostly educated white colar type people, unless they are illegal. Many illegal immigrants are transient. They come to the USA to work in low paying jobs, live in squalor to save money, and plan to leave the USA after a few years. We don't get many refugees compared to Europe, because we don't have good system to help them get on their feet. I was watching a show about Somali refugees, their lives suck in the USA. The refugee guy was saying that sure, in the USA you have some more luxuries, but it's not worth the stress. He said that if it wasn't for the danger, he would go back to Somalia where life was easier, even though they don't have so many things. I know plenty of Mexican farmworkers who feel the same way. You can't compare the USA to Europe or Brittain.

I'll believe the Somalian when he actually goes go back to Somalia over America.
Absolute and relative poverty:

"Absolute poverty refers to those without the basic necessities to sustain human health. These people do not have their basic needs met in relation to food, warmth, water and shelter. Families are in absolute poverty when their incomes are insufficient to obtain the minimum necessity for the maintenance of physical efficiency. Relative poverty has been defined as the inability of a citizen to participate fully in economic terms in the society in which he or she lives. Both absolute and relative poverty are common and persistent in less developed third world nations, whereas usually relative poverty is the sole form of poverty in more industrialised nations such as the America. When comparing between nations consideration must be taken not to be misled, as definitions of poverty can differ significantly."