Growing up we were very poor, my old man was a minimum wage farmer with a drinking problem. So I thought I understood poverty, until I started traveling to Mexico, and later Vietnam. I still remember seeing those little kids in Nam who had nothing but the clothes they had on. Every day for them was a struggle for survival, they either had to beg, steal, or prostitute themselves to eat. Every night they slept wherever they could find that offered some protection from the weather and predators, both animal and human. The contrast between the "haves" and the "have nots" still bothers me today.
I came to the conclusion early in life that there was just not enough resources for everyone to live the way people in the developing countries live. But since I lived in the good old USA, I wanted the, "American Dream," just like everyone else. But as I get older I've come to realize that I have a lot of possessions, most of which I really don't need. But if everyone stopped buying things they really don't need, and just started buying the necessities of life, the world economy would collapse in a very short time. There's a vicious cycle at work here that damages the environment and wastes natural resources, but thank to greed and stupidity, we seem to be stuck in it. There are just to damn many people in the world today. A small fraction of those people using modern technology can produce the goods and services we all need for a basic lifestyle. Imagine what would happen if the people in the developed countries stopped buying the little crap that they could live without. Most of which is made in poor, over populated countries like China, India, Pakistan, Vietnam, etc. The people in those countries would be out of work, hungry, and want to take it out on someone. After the bloody revolutions they would probably come after those of us who still had enough to eat.
Early during my lifetime the United States was the worlds number one manufacture of goods, we were also the number one lender of money to developing countries. But during the Reagan Presidency the large corporations realized that they could manufacture their products in third world countries with non union labor and raise their profits. A side benefit of this was that it weakened the unions here. By exporting our manufacturing and technology we may have raised the standard of living slightly for some of the people in the developing nations. But we started lowering it for our children and grandchildren. We went from being a manufacturing power to a nation that depended on providing services and importing goods. We have gone from being the world’s number one lender of capital, to being the world’s biggest one debtor nation. Family incomes have been steadily declining. With the exception of the Banking and Financial Services, most service jobs don't pay well, and have few benefits. And it looks to me like this downhill decline speeded up rapidly under George W. Bush's policies of greed and stupidity.
In the long run the developed nations either have to convince their citizens to make do with less, or continue find ways to keep the undeveloped countries down and easy to exploit. We can probably accomplish that by promoting wars and limiting access to birth control and information about family planning. And since the United States and our allies depend heavily on sales of weapons for revenue, we will most likely continue supporting one side or the other of any conflict, even when it is none of our business. And thanks to all of the various religions that do their best to make sure that poor people have large families they can't support, there will always be a steady supply of cannon fodder to fight on all sides.
I really think our world has reached a tipping point, we either work out a system where the resources are divided on a more equitable basis and we start doing something about population control, or we all go down together. We can get serious about developing and using renewable energy, or we can prepare for a constant state of war with other military powers for earths declining oil and other resources. I really think we're staring into the abyss, and all I can do is hope the human race will come to the realization that we only have one planet, we either find a way to live and work together for the common good, or we face the consequences.
Share
Print
Save