"Poverty is not naturally occurring; it is a policy choice." Rep. Ayanna Pressley. pic.twitter.com/qwp3oMgw6R
— COMMON (@common) February 10, 2021
Thomas Hobbs was correct when described the natural state of man:
In such condition, there is no place for industry; because the fruit thereof is uncertain: and consequently no culture of the earth; no navigation, nor use of the commodities that may be imported by sea; no commodious building; no instruments of moving, and removing, such things as require much force; no knowledge of the face of the earth; no account of time; no arts; no letters; no society; and which is worst of all, continual fear, and danger of violent death; and the life of man, solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short.
The laws of thermodynamics make this clear. Without the input of work, a system tends towards disorder.
Food won’t grow without effort. Bridges won’t spontaneously erect themselves. Modern society is the product of the incalculable amount of labor people put in over generations and millennia to make life better. The people who put in the effort do so expecting to be compensated for it.
If that effort was turned off, society would crumble back into the raw materials from which it came.
It only comes from living an entire life in such absolute privilege and luxury does it seem like wealth is the natural state of man and grinding poverty and starvation is not.
If Pressley wants to experience the real natural state of man, in all of its nastiness and brutishness, all she needs to do is discourage those who put in the effort to maintain society from putting in that effort. It is mind-blowing how quickly the collapse back into grinding misery and poverty occurs.
She intends to make the policy choices that reduce everyone else to poverty.
Give everyone $10M Funky Joe Fun Bucks, set a price freeze on everything and a minimum wage of $1000/hr, and we’ll all be rich, right Ms Presley?
Modern liberalism (a.k.a. socialism and fascism) is a death cult. They embrace every crackpot doomsday scenario that comes along, including the population bomb of the 1960s, global cooling in the 70s, Reagan-will-kill-us-all-with-nukes of the 80s, to peak oil, Y2K, and global warming, and now the Wuhan virus.
Once a man stops believing in God, he does not believe nothing, instead he will believe anything.
Their goal is a socialists utopia, a heaven on earth, which is why they explicitly reject a higher power. Big government becomes their god, their article of faith, complete with their own dogma. They view their work as noble, for what could be more important than to create a perfect utopia on earth for all mankind? But then it becomes all too easy to justify the sacrifice of a few million people here and there on the road to “perfection”.
Actually, I kind of agree with her words. Although, what I think her intent is diametrically opposite of what I agree with.
Poverty is policy choice, but not necessarily a government policy. Personal policy.
Yes, there will be people who no matter what choices they make, will see their opportunities stripped away from them. (Which is exactly the result of policies she is advocating, by the way.)
Poverty in the US is not really poverty. It is having a household income below some arbitrary dollar number. There are plenty of people living in rural towns and villages that have incomes below the poverty line, yet are they really living in “poverty?”
Setting a government policy that gives away money to stop poverty has always resulted in more people living below the poverty line, not less. On the other hand, jobs has clearly demonstrated that poverty can be beaten. Yet, the democrats seem opposed to industry for some reason…