Ask HN: How can we solve world poverty | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: How can we solve world poverty

7 pointsMaven91122 comments

Serious question. The poorest of the poor, those who live off of 1-2$/day There is enough food and moneybut inefficencies, corruption and bad governement.

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Making the rural poor richer is hard. As they get more and more of their needs met by the market they are competing with people thousands of times richer than they are. Simply increasing their incomes is not necessarily an answer, although it is part of the puzzle.

The real key is how can they turn what they have (land, sunlight, sometimes water) into what they need (everything else) _without_ having to go to buy things when they need essential needs met. It's not as simple as self-reliance, but admitting that the poor are poor and making them a little richer is not going to stop them being poor.

So most of the problems of the poor are basic infrastructure - contaminated water supply and cooking over open fires are huge issues. Both of those are tech-fix issues: cheap, reliable water filters and efficient cook stoves exist. They're coming down in price and improving. Toilets are another huge win, although the technology is less ready.

One Acre Fund has a programme which doubles farm yields; they've done tens of thousands of farms in Africa already with excellent results and are scaling fast.

If you're interested in software, three areas: medical expert systems, farming expert systems, and basic education services from primary level up.

If we could just get that set done, we'd have roughly doubled their standard of living without having put them into direct economic competition with the rich for more of their basic needs. This is not a common perspective, but it actually makes sense. The conventional development agendas do not really consider increased economic competition in their models at any deep level, resulting in very poor results so far.

Hope that's helpful. http://hexayurt.com

In the last couple years or so I've had the opportunity to travel Morocco, heard stories from my mom who volunteered as a doctor in Haiti after the earthquake, and got an opportunity to discuss some of the challenges that volunteers on the ground face with someone high up in Engineers Without Boarders. After all of these experiences I have grown very cynical about the ability for us to create a long lasting positive change around the world. There is so much that needs to happen in poorer countries in order for then to reach sustainable improvement that it's becoming harder and harder for me to believe that it is possible. The one thing that I would say would make a drastic improvement is a complete overhaul of the education system, and I think they need to emulate online education that is on the rise in north america rather then our traditional school structure.

Now maybe it's just that I am a developer and I have an instinct to see technology as the solution, but I honestly think that it would solve a lot of the major problems.

1) It allows people to work through material at their own pace so in countries where people are not able to get educations due to having to work full time this would allow them to get an education at the pace that they are able to.

2) Having access to teachers and curriculum that is well above what is currently available would allow people to learn things they would have never been able to since often people with those kinds of expertise are near non-existent in these poorer countries.

It may sound weird but I honestly believe that for these countries to improve we need to commit to establishing solid internet availability worldwide, and making a high quality free online education to everyone world wide.

My wife and I have been donating an increasing percentage of our yearly gross income to effective aid organizations:

http://blog.printf.net/articles/2012/11/27/celebrating-seven...

Earning a tech worker salary and giving a significant amount of it towards poverty relief is better than most alternative ideas I've been able to think of.

The other good idea is to follow GiveWell very closely: http://www.givewell.org/

If you want to do something with code.. I'm optimistic that people would donate more if they could feel an emotional connection to the people they're helping, and the internet can help with that, so anything that removes barriers like http://kiva.org or http://watsi.org seems promising.

Thanks, givewell seems like a neat website!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copenhagen_Consensus

Thanks, didn't hear about this, and landed on a Ted talk about Bjorn Lomborg.

But do you know of any groups trying to implement this ? Would you also happen to have any involvement with them ?

Poverty is a misleading word. You can be poor with a 20K$/y salary in one place and filthy rich in another. It's not because some people live more simple lives that they are poor. A poor person is a person who cannot meet its basic needs. You cannot help the mentally ill by giving them money either. Poverty exists because of diversity as well, trying to make someone else think like you is a form of indoctrination. Some people prefer technology other prefer nature, some prefer money other prefer fresh air, clean water and lots of time with close friends and family. It's hard to label some people as poor when they live happier and healthier lives than people with big bank accounts, big houses and fancy cars.

This is a good point that a lot of people sometimes forget. We should help countries that want our help, but at the same time it is not our job to try and make every country like us. Some countries function differently. And if the people are ok with it that way, then maybe that is ok for them.

This topic is one of internal conflict for me at times because I believe that Theocratic countries that are underdeveloped right now will never be able to develop fully in the western sense of the word. But maybe they don't need to, maybe they like the way things are. I don't know, sorry about rambling for a bit there.

There is a whole moral debate around the words "good" and "bad"; and I think that words like "developed" and "growth" have to be weighed in that sense. "Developed" might mean better quality of life, but it could also mean pollution,noise, stress, depression and dehumanization. To whoever wants to change the world I recommend to start by changing their own back yard. There are enough challenges in developed countries as it is, "underdeveloped" countries are facing their own challenges. Travel the world and you'll find problems and solutions, listen to the media and you'll be a blind man serving someone else's interest.

60 minutes had a segment on Mercy Ship, which was really interesting and gives hope there's people ready to make change in this world:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JPojrMobnyI

Teach people that they can learn. That basic skills can help you build a home, or a city. That your civilization cannot blossom if you don't handle waste properly. Teach people to manage domesticated animals, and farming.

Thanks, That's some good suggestions, and which I think a lot of poverty activists know of, but do you know of any NGOs / programs that are currently doing this, and that are hopefully succesful too ?

I dont know why I was downvoted. Here is a talk of a brave man who turned a poor, uneducated town, and helped them make something of themselves: http://www.ted.com/talks/bunker_roy.html

wasn't me, I don't even have enough karma to downvote : )

"That basic skills can help you build a home, or a city. That your civilization cannot blossom" - Not everybody wants to live in a western home, some people have houses that may appear "poor looking", but are in fact well adapted to their environment. Not every one wants to live in a city. Many believe that growth itself is the cause of inequalities and sustainability and economical "equilibrium" would be the alternative utopia to growth.

Many slums around the world continually trash their own environment. Whether it's because of inefficient and public facing sewage systems, or because people defecate or throw trash in public spaces. There are basic things that people need to live healthy lives. I never said that they should become more Western, or that they should live in a city.

If you're concerned by slums, I say start by looking at solutions for the ghettos in your own country. The third world is not very far. Kudos for your intentions and beware of the media.

We can de the generation... (lots of insights in these) http://www.owen.org/blog/6588

Diet for a Small Planet outlined some of the political issues involved. You could read that. Second, support anything which promotes better education and more independence. A lot of charities worsen the problem by promoting dependence, among other things.

The book is a bit dated (1971), and from what I understand, it is promoting vegetarianism. I'l still take a look at it : )

Later books by the author suggested "one less hamburger" would do a lot and, iirc, about half the book is about her research into how foreign food aid made locals dependent on diets they could not afford and stuff like that.

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