The poor and their compulsions

Questions about poverty are important when considering means to develop better welfare and development schemes

Why do poor people remain poor? Besides structural issues which compound poverty, are there other factors which can explain the intergenerational nature of poverty? While one needs to be careful not to blame the poor for their poverty, such questions are important when considering means to develop better welfare and development schemes.

The famous French sociologist Bourdieu had explained how social groups behave and find themselves in similar situations across generations using the notions of habitus and cultural capital. Habitus refers to ingrained habits, skills and dispositions of a group of people, which are passed on from one generation to another. Besides passing on counter-productive habits, the lack of ‘cultural capital’ or access to networks of privilege remains an important factor which explains the neglect and marginalisation of poorer people across generations.

A Dutch historian, Rutger Bregman, thinks of the problem of poverty in another interesting way. Bregman examines the basic question of why the poor make poor decisions. He points out how people in poverty do also tend to have more unhealthy lifestyles and they make less rational choices than those better off. However, Bregman argues that poverty isn’t a character flaw, instead bad choices made by poorer people are a direct outcome of their circumstances.

There are, of course, poor people who can transcend ingrained habits or even a range of other circumstantial limitations which reinforce their poverty. In some countries, there are more opportunities for improving social mobility of the poor than in others. In poorer countries, the chances of climbing out of poverty are lesser given the scarcity of educational and employment opportunities, and the lack of preventative measures to curb exploitation of the poor. For instance, a vast number of poor people in developing countries still work in the informal sector, where there are no regulations to protect their rights as workers.

The idea of using universal basic income schemes to overcome the problem of poverty has been gaining increasing attention. The idea was initially promoted in the 1960s by Milton Friedman, the father of neoliberalism. Experiments are currently under way in Finland, Kenya, India and the US.

Universal basic income schemes are meant to provide an unconditional, regular monetary payment made to each citizen to help meet the necessities of life. Proponents of this approach see it as a simple solution to unemployment and automation. However, emphasis on providing a universal basic income is not without contention.

Many poorer countries lack adequate resources to guarantee unconditional provision of access to a universal basic income for their entire population. Countries like Pakistan have thus experimented with the idea of targeting the poorest of the poor, via the Benazir Income Support Programme, for instance. The effective targeting the worthiest candidates for income support also remains a major challenge.

Besides securing adequate funds to offer a basic unconditional income to all, or to those most in need, there are other serious concerns associated with this approach. The reason why economically conservative politicians and big businessmen are supporting universal basic income may be to push the state to deregulate further. Adopting a universal basic income scheme could help create the justification for more rapid withdrawal of funding for health and social welfare.

Increasing popularity of unconditional basic income schemes may help address destitution or absolute poverty to some extent. However, overcoming glaring disparities, exploitation and marginalisation of poorer people needs more than a basic incomes guarantee, it needs sufficient public spending to ensure adequate healthcare, education and other essential services widely available to help make social mobility an achievable reality for more people around the world.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 19^th, 2018.

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