[Captain Obvious]

I was rather surprised I didn't see a thread about this piece of legislation in here. I have no issues about giving money to countries for food or health aid so long as it serves our strategic interests in some way but to take on such a lofty goal is rather stupid for any country to undergo just to be nice.

[Rumor]

I am of the mindset that we should fix our poverty issues before attempting to fix everyone elses.

[Buckaroo]

This is another attempt by Sen. Barack Obama to redistribute US wealth to others.

S. 2433: Global Poverty Act of 2007 (GovTrack.us)

[OldManMac]

Originally Posted by Captain Obvious 

but to take on such a lofty goal is rather stupid for any country to undergo just to be nice.

Don't fret; the United States government rarely does anything just to be nice to other countries.

[peeb]

This isn't really a big deal. It simply puts a pretty small amount of money behind the Millennium Development Goals, which are a set of objectives nearly every country has signed up to. This specific piece sets out to halve the number of people living on less than a dollar a day by 2015.

It's rather naive in this day and age to think that this is not an issue of concern to the US.

[nonhuman]

Originally Posted by Rumor 

I am of the mindset that we should fix our poverty issues before attempting to fix everyone elses.

What poverty issues? Even the poorest people in our country are vastly better off than the majority of people on Earth...

[OldManMac]

Originally Posted by nonhuman 

What poverty issues? Even the poorest people in our country are vastly better off than the majority of people on Earth...

You're right; it's okay to sleep under bridges and in homeless shelters, and panhandle on street corners.

[peeb]

Fortunately the choice is not between dealing with one of these issues of the other. They are separate and unrelated. Trying to claim that if you put a modest amount of money into global poverty issues you are short changing the homeless in Detroit is bogus.

[nonhuman]

Originally Posted by OldManMac 

You're right; it's okay to sleep under bridges and in homeless shelters, and panhandle on street corners.

Compared to living in constant fear of death squads and not knowing when and where you'll next be able to get clean water to drink: yes.

[peeb]

I agree with you nonhuman, but this comparison is pointless. It's like arguing whether cancer or aids is worse. There's no point.

[nonhuman]

Originally Posted by peeb 

I agree with you nonhuman, but this comparison is pointless. It's like arguing whether cancer or aids is worse. There's no point.

I very much disagree. The fact that 'poverty' in the US is relatively luxurious compared to poverty elsewhere is probably a large contributing factor to the amount of illegal immigration we have.

Given the choice between living in what amounts to a giant garbage pile next to the train tracks (try taking the train through rural China and you'll see what I mean) and living on the streets of a wealthy country with plenty of areas with Mediterranean or Sub-Tropical climates, which would you choose?

If we're already so well off that people want to be poor Americans, then what are we complaining about?

[OldManMac]

Originally Posted by nonhuman 

Compared to living in constant fear of death squads and not knowing when and where you'll next be able to get clean water to drink: yes.

A tiny minority of the world's poor live in constant fear of death squads. Clean water doesn't do anyone any good if they can't get to it, and that includes most of the homeless in the U. S. as well. If you're living in a cardboard box in a large city, you may have clean water to drink (and you just as likely may not, as public water fountains are becoming fewer and fewer and farther between), but you rarely have good nutritious food to eat, and you are often mentally disturbed, and you rarely practice clean hygiene, and your possessions fit in a box, which you drag along with you, in your transient lifestyle. Besides, making comparisons to the poor elsewhere is irrelevant. When I was a child my mother always told me to eat all my food, as there were starving children in India, as if that was somehow relevant to me. I was not a starving Indian child, because my parents provided for me. One could argue that it's a stroke of luck, or providence, or whatever, that I wasn't, but it wouldn't change the basic facts. The homeless in Seattle, or Detroit, or L.A., or any other place, aren't concerned with the poor in other countries; they're struggling to make it from day to day, and throwing cliches around does nothing for them.

[OldManMac]

Originally Posted by nonhuman 

If we're already so well off that people want to be poor Americans, then what are we complaining about?

I feel quite confident in saying that people don't want to be poor Americans.

[nonhuman]

Originally Posted by OldManMac 

I feel quite confident in saying that people don't want to be poor Americans.

Then why do we have milliions of people coming here illegally every year just to trim our yards and clean our bathrooms?

I know a woman with a graduate degree in psychology that would have guaranteed her a decent job in Mexico, but she still chose to come to the US illegally with her two daughters to work as a housecleaner.

[peeb]

Originally Posted by nonhuman 

I know a woman with a graduate degree in psychology that would have guaranteed her a decent job in Mexico, but she still chose to come to the US illegally with her two daughters to work as a housecleaner.

She's not living on the streets though, is she?

[nonhuman]

Originally Posted by OldManMac 

A tiny minority of the world's poor live in constant fear of death squads. Clean water doesn't do anyone any good if they can't get to it, and that includes most of the homeless in the U. S. as well. If you're living in a cardboard box in a large city, you may have clean water to drink (and you just as likely may not, as public water fountains are becoming fewer and fewer and farther between), but you rarely have good nutritious food to eat, and you are often mentally disturbed, and you rarely practice clean hygiene, and your possessions fit in a box, which you drag along with you, in your transient lifestyle. Besides, making comparisons to the poor elsewhere is irrelevant. When I was a child my mother always told me to eat all my food, as there were starving children in India, as if that was somehow relevant to me. I was not a starving Indian child, because my parents provided for me. One could argue that it's a stroke of luck, or providence, or whatever, that I wasn't, but it wouldn't change the basic facts. The homeless in Seattle, or Detroit, or L.A., or any other place, aren't concerned with the poor in other countries; they're struggling to make it from day to day, and throwing cliches around does nothing for them.

I agree that life sucks for the homeless in the US. I grew up in Berkeley and volunteered at a homeless shelter in high school, so I've got a pretty good idea of what it's like to be homeless in the US.

But the fact remains that even though public water fountains are becoming less common, clean drinking water is still readily available to anyone who wants it here. The same can't even be said for people who own homes in many parts of the world. And yes, the death squads is a bit of an edge case, but it's still a valid one, and one that's all too often ignored here in the US.

[nonhuman]

Originally Posted by peeb 

She's not living on the streets though, is she?

No, and she owns a car. Which is kinda my point.

[peeb]

Originally Posted by nonhuman 

No, and she owns a car. Which is kinda my point.

Well, if your point is that people want to be wealthy Americans (and in the context we're talking about, owning a car makes you 'wealthy'), then yes. This bill deals with people who live on less than a dollar a day.

[nonhuman]

Originally Posted by peeb 

Well, if your point is that people want to be wealthy Americans (and in the context we're talking about, owning a car makes you 'wealthy'), then yes. This bill deals with people who live on less than a dollar a day.

My point was more that an illegal immigrant who isn't even technically allowed to hold a job can still make enough money in the US to raise two children as a single mother and own a car.

That is what it means to be impoverished in the US. If people with no legal framework of support whatsoever can be 'wealthy' in the US, then I really don't see where we get off talking about poverty in the sense of it being unavoidable/institutionalized.

[peeb]

So you don't begrudge a bit of help to the less than dollar a day crowd?

[nonhuman]

Originally Posted by peeb 

So you don't begrudge a bit of help to the less than dollar a day crowd?

If we're going to be giving help to anyone at all, that's who it should go to.

Assuming we're talking about the US here. Less than a dollar a day may sound like nothing, but depending on where you are that's not necessarily the reality.

[peeb]

The dollar a day figure is usually calculated at purchasing price parity, if that's what you mean (although I can't think of anywhere where a dollar a day is a lot), and no, this bill is talking about 'global poverty', not US poverty.

[spacefreak]

Originally Posted by OldManMac 

I feel quite confident in saying that people don't want to be poor Americans.

Sure, nobody wants to be poor. However, there are people who don't want to work and be responsible.

Look at our unemployment rate of 5%. Economists often classify an economy as having "full employment" if the unemployment rate is 5% or less. One notion is that out of every 100 people, there will be 5 who just won't or don't work, for whatever reasons, regardless of the state of the economy.

Poverty is similar. The opportunities are present for many to help themselves, they just have to (1) be willing to accept help, and (2) know where to get help and how to go about it.

[nonhuman]

Originally Posted by peeb 

The dollar a day figure is usually calculated at purchasing price parity, if that's what you mean (although I can't think of anywhere where a dollar a day is a lot), and no, this bill is talking about 'global poverty', not US poverty.

When I was in China, I calculated that I could live in Shanghai comfortably (which is relatively luxurious compared to the vast majority of Chinese people, and probably a little sub-par compared to most foreigners there) on about $200 per month. That adds up to just under $7 per day. Shanghai is probably the most expensive part of mainland China to live in. I also spent some time living out in the country in Nanxun, Anji, and Huzhou. I'd say living there would easily cut my expenses in half, and those are still cities of about a million people or so. Way out in the boonies, I could totally see it being possible to live decently well on $1 per day.

[peeb]

I don't think you're taking the purchasing price parity into consideration there, are you?

"One Dollar per Day

The international dollar-per-day poverty standard was developed by the World Bank for its 1990 World Development Report in order to provide a single global measurement. To account for exchange rates and differences in prices and gross domestic product (GDP), the World Bank had to set a level that would be relevant in underdeveloped, developing, and developed countries despite immense differences in the meaning of poverty around the world.

Generally speaking, earning a dollar per day or less means that a person in any country is living in "extreme poverty," which means that that person cannot afford to buy even the most basic human necessities. However, "one dollar a day" is not a literal amount of money. Rather, it means a dollar a day at purchasing power parity in 1985 prices. Purchasing power parity (PPP) is a way to measure the value of currency that allows economists and poverty researchers to compare the standards of living in different countries while accounting for differences in both wages and costs of living. In general, PPP refers to the goods and services that a currency has the power to buy, typically expressed as a "basket" or "bundle" of necessary items. PPP measures how much the same basket or bundle of goods and services costs around the world; allowing for exchange rates, the PPP number in each country should allow people to purchase the same basket of goods and services that a U.S. dollar can purchase in the United States. As with absolute poverty (see above), critics of PPP point out that one problem with the measure lies in the notion of what is and is not a necessity: a product or service considered a staple in one culture may be a luxury in others. Nevertheless, most researchers agree that purchasing power parity is, to date, the best way to examine poverty at the global level.

Because the dollar-a-day standard was conceived in 1990, currency values of 1985 were used as a baseline. By 1993 the value of the U.S. dollar had changed, so that "one dollar a day" was actually equal to $1.08 per day. Nevertheless, the term "dollar a day" is still used because it is simpler and easier to remember. To measure "poverty"—as distinguished from "extreme poverty"—the World Bank uses a two-dollars-per-day standard, meaning that anyone earning less than two dollars per day is living in poverty. In this measurement the concept of purchasing power parity is the same, but the two-dollars-per-day standard allows researchers to study the poor in slightly less impoverished countries while still using the PPP standard."

What Is Poverty? - Poverty Lines And The Dollar-a-day Standard

[nonhuman]

Originally Posted by peeb 

I don't think you're taking the purchasing price parity into consideration there, are you?

No I'm not, and neither are the vast majority of people who talk about how impoverished people are for making only dollars per day.

[peeb]

Originally Posted by nonhuman 

No I'm not, and neither are the vast majority of people who talk about how impoverished people are for making only dollars per day.

Most people who talk about it professionally, or who know anything about the issue, use the term to refer to the World Bank measure. I agree that many people who don't understand it use it in some looser sense.

[Doofy]

Smells like commies to me.

[Chongo]

The problem with sending aid, especially money, is that it rarely gets to the people. Look what happened to the money that was raised by Live Aid. Most of the money that was raised went into the pockets of the war lords. The only thing that they have to show for it is a dam on a dry river.

The socialist junta in Burma seized the first plane load of food and gave it to the army.
Burmese Way to Socialism

[peeb]

Originally Posted by Chongo 

The problem with sweeping generalizations, especially dumb ones, is that they are rarely more than partially true.

Fixed that for you.

Originally Posted by Chongo 

Look what happened to the money that was raised by Live Aid.

What was that, 20 years ago? It was hardly representative of aid efforts.

Originally Posted by Chongo 

Most of the money that was raised went into the pockets of the war lords.

Care to explain what leads you to claim that?

Originally Posted by Chongo 

The socialist junta in Burma seized the first plane load of food and gave it to the army.

That is true - Burma is an outlier on the ****ed up scale.

[Chongo]

The problem with sending aid to Marxist regimes, is that is does more harm than good.

Most of the money that was raised went into the pockets of the war lords.

I stand corrected. The money went to prop up the Marxist dictatorship of Col. Haile Mariam Mengistu. He was using the famine as a way of killing off his enemies.

Care to explain what leads you to claim that?

CNN did a story several years ago on what did our Live Aid donations go for. CNN showed a video of Bob Geldof on top of a dam on a dry river.
Here are a couple of stories, but you can Google for yourself.
We Are The '80's!
David Rieff: Did Live Aid do more harm than good? | World news | The Guardian

[peeb]

So you have no evidence for your statement? Those are two opinion pieces, neither of which substantiate the claim you made. Of course, your feverish lurch into ideological ranting with no basis in fact distracts us from the point, which is 20 years on from your obsession with the cold war.

A more interesting question the sterile ideological 'debate' you want to lure us into (one for which little evidence exists on either side) is what you think of the current act.