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Building Better Policy Towards the Poor

Building Better Policy Towards the Poor

Jan 18, 2021

This is going to be a little long, so bear with me.

As I was walking today, I thought with greater clarity of my thoughts on the poor and our response. I spend so much time in "battle mode" these days that I don't have the luxury of being strategic. And that is probably the most common reason we consistently fail to create sound, reasonable policy.

The cold hard facts about poverty is that we can't have a one size universal poverty policy because there are so many factors. Multiple barriers on the road out, multiple hurdles to overcome to even get started and multiple prejudices to overcome in addressing it. For me i have done a crude cost/benefit analysis, and determined that at 50, the cost of the things I would need to do to "escape" poverty is not worth the very limited benefit I would accrue.

And I need you to be OK with that. Let me focus on how I can build better for future generations.

I am going to start this by pulling a chapter out of my personal journey. I started back in college wanting to take a single web design course. When I inquired about it, I was advised to instead sign up for a 2 year IT course that led me to get my Bachelors so I could finish the damn thing. So you might say I fell into it by accident.

If you're truly interested in the poor, what I suggest you do is have real, meaningful, targeted conversations with the poor. Invest in it. Invite them to lunch (the entire family), and host them as you would if a person you greatly admire was coming to dinner. Because they SHOULD be someone you greatly admire, and your hospitality should reflect that.

Sit down and discuss what they want, what comfort would look like to them. Get past the superficial banality of things and learn what drives them, what motivates them. I remember one very hardworking friend who commented that she wanted, one time, to be able to take her daughter to Disney World and not have to say, "we can't afford that" every time her eye caught something that she adored.

That was it. She wanted to be treated with the dignity that many take for granted for a few short days out of her life. In my opinion that was a reasonable ask.

For others, it might be not having to go to the laundromat (for me, I actually prefer it. It is more time efficient, ads everything can be washed at once, and I don't have to pay the maintenance cost of expensive machines). What that looks like will vary from individual to individual.

What you will find consistently, though, is that money is not what we most value. In fact, money among the poor is often shared with those who have less, because we are intimately aware of our mutual vulnerabilities. For us it is not about charity or generosity as much as it is about triage: take care of those of us who need it, first.

Then ask the question of whether they WANT to escape poverty, or whether they simply want security. The answer might surprise you. For me, it has always been about being treated with dignity. I wanted my degree because I didn't want to continually have to answer embarrassing and belittling questions about why I did not have one at reunions. But, as a recent thread reminded me, there are still those who will never respect your degree unless you have the bank account to back it.

The pathway out of poverty should be a personalized one, and unless you are connected, you cannot truly understand how to help. Connect, build relationships and understand. This will accomplish so much more.

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