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The history of the end of poverty has just begun

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Re: The history of the end of poverty has just begun

#141

Post by throwaway0a5e »

goodpoint wrote: post #114
WalterBright wrote: post #33

The end of poverty began in the US around 1800, when the specter of famine was finally eliminated. Throughout the 19th century, Americans grew in height and life expectancy, resulting in America's poor being the richest poor people in the world. Today, America's poor have a better quality of life than medieval kings.

> Today, America's poor have a better quality of life than medieval kings. And work two jobs and go bankrupt and die of some treatable disease? I'd rather be poor in any european country or Korea or Japan. Besides, that's a pretty cheeky comparison.

>And work two jobs and go bankrupt and die of some treatable disease? I'd rather be poor in any european country

Belarus?

Re: The history of the end of poverty has just begun

#142

Post by Koshkin »

altvali wrote: post #137
WalterBright wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

History shows that confiscating the wealth of the wealthy has a negative effect on the poor.

Can you elaborate? I'm interested to learn more.

An example: the communist revolution in Russia in 1917. (The “negative effect” included millions of people getting murdered, killed by the famine, or imprisoned.)

Re: The history of the end of poverty has just begun

#143

Post by TimTheTinker »

BorisTheBrave wrote: post #118
coldtea wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They have access to all the world's information. So? The Kings had access to much more information than they cared about already. > They can travel across continents in a number of hours for less than two weeks wages. A big chunk can't even afford to take a couple of sick days off, lest they be fired, or can't afford to retire and work in their late 60s and 70s in shitty jobs like a Walmart greeter - much less trav…

I don't think you've really thought about how awful the middle ages are. > The Kings had access to much more information than they cared about already. Royals used to have portraits painted and transported just so they could get an idea who the person their arranged marriage with actually looked like. Bet they'd like Facebook. Louis XIV commissioned a more accurate map of france. It took 4 generations to make. The fi…

People really underestimate just how hard life was in prior ages, especially due to disease.

An old person my wife once talked to said that "penicillin changed everything". It certainly did, along with vaccines and other very effective treatments (including hand-washing!) for once-deadly diseases such as dysentery, typhoid, cholera, diphtheria, whooping cough, measles, scarlet fever, tuberculosis, mumps, even leprosy.

Death was a major part of life for folks living prior to the late 1800s. Everyone experienced frequent life-threatening sickness and death of close friends, infants & children, family members, and acquaintances.

If I had a choice, and avoiding a very hard life & early death were my only criteria, I'd choose to live now rather than then, regardless of social status.

Re: The history of the end of poverty has just begun

#144

Post by noahtallen »

WalterBright wrote: post #33

The end of poverty began in the US around 1800, when the specter of famine was finally eliminated. Throughout the 19th century, Americans grew in height and life expectancy, resulting in America's poor being the richest poor people in the world. Today, America's poor have a better quality of life than medieval kings.

> Today, America's poor have a better quality of life than medieval kings.

This can’t be true. Just look at the homelessness situation across the US. No shelter, no income, no sanitation. That is certainly worse quality of life than a king.

You must starting your definition of poor quite a ways up the income scale. Maybe you could make make an argument for solidly middle class and above?

Even then, there are even a lot of benefits to being a king which probably outweigh having basic modern amenities like running water and a nice bed. Who needs plumbing when you have a servant to bring you whatever you want?

Beyond that, quality of life is also significantly emotional. There’s a lot of stress to life unless you’re rich, and you also don’t have very much control over things around you. A king has a significant amount of control by definition, and that probably contributes a lot to their quality of life.

Re: The history of the end of poverty has just begun

#145

Post by greysphere »

danschmitt wrote: post #24

It is always nice to see such narratives based on robust data. For similar stories backed by data I can also recommend the book "Factfulnes" by Hans Rosling [1]. When we talk about basic needs, our global community is making tremendous progress. At the same time, we should not forget that the same system that abolishes poverty also creates enormous inequality, which not only makes people unhappier, but also leads to…

>we should not forget that the same system that abolishes poverty also creates enormous inequality

Is this true? The post uses Sweden as the exemplar, which has the lowest poverty (on its chart) and also one of the lowest inequalities as measured by the Gini coeffcient (30).

This page [1] seems to offer a handful of data, but nothing that outlines a clear 'higher Gini -> less poverty.' If anything it seems pretty uncorrelated. It does posit the related: higher average income _allows_ for a higher Gini because there's a limited amount of poverty people can suffer before dying.

A bit more research into Sweden specifically reveals that its Gini has gone up a bit the last 30 years, but seems like it was trending toward more equality before then [2].

[1] https://ourworldindata.org/income-inequality

[2] https://www.chartbookofeconomicinequality.com/inequality-by-...

Re: The history of the end of poverty has just begun

#146

Post by zozbot234 »

willjp wrote: post #135

I'd be much happier if UBI proposals were higher. Living on ~900$/month nowadays would be difficult. 20 years ago I was able to split rent for a tiny concrete windowless-basement-bedroom for 450$/mo, trimmed my grocery/cleaning bill down to 100$/mo by eating nothing but rice, beans, and frozen vegetables, 120$/mo for a phone and internet (which I consider essential), and another ~80$/mo in bus tickets. That's ~750$/m…

$900/mo. is near the high-end of the feasible UBI range. If you want to live on your UBI, it's pretty much expected that you'd move to the lowest-cost feasible area, and content yourself with a somewhat dignified subsistence. UBI has by far the most potential as a supplemental income to low-skilled, entry-level or low-intensity work. The key aim is to make it seamless for people to enter or leave the job market as they choose, which removes the threat of exploitive "wage slavery".

Re: The history of the end of poverty has just begun

#147

Post by throwaway1777 »

ProfessorLayton wrote: post #138
willjp wrote: post #135

I'd be much happier if UBI proposals were higher. Living on ~900$/month nowadays would be difficult. 20 years ago I was able to split rent for a tiny concrete windowless-basement-bedroom for 450$/mo, trimmed my grocery/cleaning bill down to 100$/mo by eating nothing but rice, beans, and frozen vegetables, 120$/mo for a phone and internet (which I consider essential), and another ~80$/mo in bus tickets. That's ~750$/m…

The solution to your housing costs isn't increased payments, but cheaper housing. Housing prices are spiraling out of control almost everywhere because we refuse to build more of it through asinine zoning restrictions. High housing costs have such ripple effects on the cost of everything else that it's incredibly frustrating to see everything else but cheaper and more available housing be proposed as a means to help…

I kind of agree with your idea that we should work to decrease housing prices, but the problems with housing are not as simple as remove zoning and building restrictions and watch prices fall. One example. Energy prices are the base input to everything including housing, so if you want to make housing cheaper then better energy policy might be a good start.

Re: The history of the end of poverty has just begun

#148

Post by WalterBright »

noahtallen wrote: post #144
WalterBright wrote: post #33

The end of poverty began in the US around 1800, when the specter of famine was finally eliminated. Throughout the 19th century, Americans grew in height and life expectancy, resulting in America's poor being the richest poor people in the world. Today, America's poor have a better quality of life than medieval kings.

> Today, America's poor have a better quality of life than medieval kings. This can’t be true. Just look at the homelessness situation across the US. No shelter, no income, no sanitation. That is certainly worse quality of life than a king. You must starting your definition of poor quite a ways up the income scale. Maybe you could make make an argument for solidly middle class and above? Even then, there are even a l…

The homeless issue in the US is much more of a drug addiction and alcoholism problem than a down on one's luck problem. Something like 90% of the homeless are in that category.

> Who needs plumbing when you have a servant to bring you whatever you want?

I like hot showers. I bet you do, too. Besides, what do you think happens to kings when they get a toothache? No anesthetic, nothing to be done except an idiot with a pair of pliers and filthy hands. I doubt many kings had teeth after 35 or so.

> There’s a lot of stress to life unless you’re rich,

I'm afraid that's pretty presumptuous. The rich just have different problems.

> and you also don’t have very much control over things around you. A king has a significant amount of control by definition, and that probably contributes a lot to their quality of life.

When you're the king, everyone wants to kill you. Including your own brothers and sisters and kids. You have no friends. The losers in the game of thrones are always killed.

Re: The history of the end of poverty has just begun

#149

Post by WalterBright »

AnimalMuppet wrote: post #111
coldtea wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They have access to all the world's information. So? The Kings had access to much more information than they cared about already. > They can travel across continents in a number of hours for less than two weeks wages. A big chunk can't even afford to take a couple of sick days off, lest they be fired, or can't afford to retire and work in their late 60s and 70s in shitty jobs like a Walmart greeter - much less trav…

Henry VIII didn't die from violence. He died from (probably) complications of obesity at 55. I'd rather be some random middle-class female from Ohio than one of Henry's wives, though. In fact, I'd rather be some random middle-class female from Ohio than any female in the Middle Ages, because of the dangers of childbirth back then.

Henry VIII lived in constant agony from a jousting injury. The witch doctors of the day could do nothing for him. Complications of obesity likely meant diabetes.

Re: The history of the end of poverty has just begun

#150

Post by wussboy »

WalterBright wrote: post #148
noahtallen wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Today, America's poor have a better quality of life than medieval kings. This can’t be true. Just look at the homelessness situation across the US. No shelter, no income, no sanitation. That is certainly worse quality of life than a king. You must starting your definition of poor quite a ways up the income scale. Maybe you could make make an argument for solidly middle class and above? Even then, there are even a l…

The homeless issue in the US is much more of a drug addiction and alcoholism problem than a down on one's luck problem. Something like 90% of the homeless are in that category. > Who needs plumbing when you have a servant to bring you whatever you want? I like hot showers. I bet you do, too. Besides, what do you think happens to kings when they get a toothache? No anesthetic, nothing to be done except an idiot with a…

As Pinker points out in Enlightenment Now, progress is devilishly hard to measure. I enjoy more air conditioning than the Rothschilds. But I feel like they perhaps enjoyed other things that I can never aspire to…
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