POVERTY
329
POVERTY
public authoritiea, by churches, by religious and
secular associations, and by private individuals.
All these methods are subject to abuses, but all are
necessary. In many countries old-age pensions and
insurance, housing activities, and insurance against
sickness and other forms of disabihty, prevent a
considerable amount of poverty, and thus reUeve it
in the most effective fashion. At present poor-relief
is to a much greater extent carried on by the State,
and to a much less extent by the Church, than in the
period before the Protestant Reformation. The
remedies and preventives of poverty are as numerous
and various as the causes. Persons who attribute
it almost wholly to social influences propose social
correctives, such as legislation, and frequently some
simple form of social reconstructing — for example,
the single tax or Socialism. Persons who believe that
the indi\'idual is almost always responsible for his
poverty or for the poverty of his natural dependents
reject social remedies and insist upon the supreme
and sufficient worth of reformation of character
through education and religion. In times past the
latter attitude was much more common than to-day,
when the tendency is strongly and quite generally
toward the social \-iewpoint. Both are exaggera-
tions, and lead, therefore, to the use of one-sided and
inefficient methods of dealing with poverty. While
a large proportion of the individual causes of poverty
are ultimately traceable to social causes, to congenital
defects, or to pure misfortune, many of them never-
theless exert an original and independent influence.
This is clearly seen in the case of two persons who
have had precisely the same opportunities, enwon-
ment, and natural endowments, only one of whom is
in povertj'. For such cases indi\'idual remedies are
obviously indispensable. On the other hand, it is
only the crassly ignorant who can honestly think
that all poverty is due to indi\-idual defects, whether
culpable or not. Individual remedies, such as re-
generation of character, cannot Uft out of poverty
the wage-earner who is without employment. In-
dividual and social causes originate, produce re-
spectively their own specific influences, and can be
effectively coimteracted only by measures that affect
them directl}'.
Of the individual causes that must be prevented in whole or in part by individual regeneration, the principal are intemperance, immorality, indolence, and improvidence. All these would be responsible for many cases of poverty even if the environment and the social arrangements were ideal. Each of them is, indeed, frequently affected by social forces, and consequently is preventible to some extent by social remedies. Thus, intemperance can be diminished by a better regulation of the liquor traffic, and by every measure that makes better provision for food, clothing, housing, security, and opportunity among the poor. Inmiorality can be lessened by more stringent and effective methods of detection and punishment. Indolence can be discouraged and to some extent prevented by compulsory labour colonies, as well as by penalties infUcted upon persons who re- fuse to pro\-ide for their natural dependents. Im- providence can be greatly lessened by laws providing larger economic opportunities, insurance against disability, and better methods of sa\-ing. Yet, in every one of these cases, the remedy which aims at improvement of character will be beneficial; and in many cases it will be indispensable. The chief causes of poverty to be removed by social methods are : unemployment, low wages, sickness, accident, old age, improper woman labour and child labour, unsanitary and debilitating conditions of employ- ment, refusal of head of family to provide for support of family, and industrial inefficiency. The necessary social remedies must be a|jplied by indi\'iduals, by voluntary associations and by the State; and the
greater part of them will fall under the general head
of larger economic opportunity. If this were at-
tained to a reasonable degree, persons who are at or
below the poverty line would enjoy adequate in-
comes and better conditions of employment generally,
and thus would be enabled to protect themselves
against most of the other causes of poverty which
have just been enumerated. In great part, this
larger economic opportunity will have to come
through legislation directed towards a better or-
ganization of production and distribution, and
towards an efficient system of industrial education.
Legal provision must also be made for insurance
against sickness, accident, unemploj-ment, and old
age, and for the coercion and punishment of negligent
husbands and fathers. Since, however, many of
these social causes of poverty are frequently due, in
part at least, to indi%ddual delinquencies, they are
curable to a considerable extent by indi\ddual
remedies. Sickness, accident, inefficiency, and un-
emploj-ment are often the results of intemperance,
immorality, and indolence, ^^'henever this is the
case, the reformation of character must enter into
the remedy. In a word, we may say that the cor-
rectives of some causes of poverty must be domi-
nantly social, of others dominantly individual; but
that in nearly all cases both methods will be to some
extent effective.
The abolition of all poverty which is not due to indi\'idual fault, congenital defect, or unusual mis- fortune is one of the ideals of contemporarj' philan- thropj' and social reform. It is a noble aim, and it ought not to be impossible of realization. Against it are sometimes quoted the words of Christ: "The poor j-ou have alwaj's with you"; but this sentence is in the present tense, and it was obviously addressed to the Disciples, not to the whole world. Until the words have been authoritatively given a universal application, the repetition of them as an explanation of current poverty, or as an argument against the abolition of poverty, will be neither convincing nor edifying. Equally irrelevant is the fact that poverty is highly honoured in ascetical life and literature. In the first place, there is question here of the aboli- tion of the poverty that is involuntary, not that which is freely embraced. In the second place, re- ligious poverty generally includes those things the lack of which makes the other kind of poverty so undesirable, namely, the requisites of elementary health and comfort, and decent living. Nor should we oppose the abolition of poverty on the ground that this would lessen the opportunities of the poor to practise humility, and of the rich to exercise benevolence. At present the majority of the people are not in poverty, j'et no one urges that they should descend to that condition for the sake of the greater opportunity of humility. There would still be abun- dant room for the exercise of both these virtues after all involuntary poverty had disappeared, for there would be no lack of suffering, misfortune, and genuine need. On the other hand, those who had escaped poverty, or been lifted out of it, would be better able to practise many other virtues more beneficial than compulsory humility.
Poverty has, indeed, been a school of virtue for many persons who otherwise would not have reached such heights of moral achievement, but these are the exceptions. The vast majority of persons are better off, physically, mentally, and morally, when they are above the line which marks the lower limit of ele- mentary health, comfort, and decency. For the great majority, the wish of the Wise Man, "neither poverty nor riches", represents the most favourable condition for right and reasonable life. If any per- son sees in poverty better opportunities for virtuous living, let him embrace it, but no man ought to be compelled to take this course. After all, the proposal
