Quotes About Poverty

Inevitably, people tell me that poor folks are lazy or unintelligent, that they are somehow deserving of their poverty. However, if you begin to look at the sociological literature on poverty, a more complex picture emerges. Poverty and unemployment are part and parcel of our economic order. Without them, capitalism would cease to function effectively, and in order to continue to function, the system itself must produce poverty and an army of underemployed or unemployed people.

In today's world, people experience two types of poverty: the poverty caused by lack of food, clothing and shelter, and the poverty caused by lack of love and compassion. Of these two, the second type needs to be considered first because if we have love and compassion in our hearts, then we will wholeheartedly serve those who suffer from lack of food, clothing and shelter.

So far it has been assumed that the only pregnancies which are aborted are accidental ones and the only foetuses destroyed those whose mothers could not bear the thought of their becoming children. In a just world this would be the case, but the world is far from just. Too many women are forced to abort by poverty, by their menfolk, by their parents. Poverty has many faces; it may be the poverty of the young, the unmarried, the student, the unemployed, the female or a combination of these.

We think of violence as being conflict and fighting and wars and so forth, but the most ongoing horrific measure of violence is in the horrible poverty of the Third World... and the poverty in the United States as well. We have our own Third World here. And we have to first become aware of that and how to help and solve that.

Women continue receiving less salary for the same kind of job. Women have a higher unemployment rate in our country. When you analyze the composition of poverty, you will find that most of the families in poverty are being run by a woman.

Fundamentalism is not bred in poverty. There are plenty of poor countries in the world that don't have violence because amid the poverty there is a kind of justice and in some countries a democracy.

The poverty program was not designed to eliminate poverty.

Like slavery and apartheid, poverty is not natural. It is man-made and it can be overcome and eradicated by the actions of human beings. Overcoming poverty is not a gesture of charity. It is an act of justice... Sometimes it falls upon a generation to be great. You can be that great generation. Let your greatness blossom.

I am Catholic, I was raised Catholic, I am a practicing Catholic. But I say we need to agree to disagree. We have a shared mission around poverty, and I focus on that, because we do a lot with the Catholic Church around poverty alleviation. I'm always looking for: what is the common thread? What do we care about? What do we believe in? We believe in women around the world. We believe in all lives have equal value.

The greatest percentage of poverty is found in female-headed households. Over 70 percent of female-headed households are poor. A large percentage of poor people are children (17 percent); fully 85 percent of black children living in poverty reside in a female-headed household.

The best way to perpetuate poverty is spending on arms, and poverty itself is a form of violence. The wealthy industrialized countries have been too slow to recognize this. I hope that in this new century and new millennium, the world will learn that if you want peace, you must prepare for peace, plan for peace, work for it, and comply with its dictates. Lasting peace will never be achieved with the instruments of war.

The real tragedy of minimum wage laws is that they are supported by well-meaning groups who want to reduce poverty. But the people who are hurt most by higher minimums are the most poverty stricken.

Poverty is not a character failing or a lack of motivation. Poverty is a shortage of money.

We create institutions and policies on the basis of the way we make assumptions about us and others. We accept the fact that we will always have poor people around us. So we have had poor people around us. If we had believed that poverty is unacceptable to us, and that it should not belong to a civilized society, we would have created appropriate institutions and policies to create a poverty-free world.

There was never a war on poverty. Maybe there was a skirmish on poverty

There are some people who say that they’re concerned only with poverty but not inequality. But I don’t think that is a sustainable thought. A lot of poverty is, in fact, inequality because of the connection between income and capability—having adequate resources to take part in the life of the community.

The poverty line understates the true amount of poverty because it measures it as three times the breadbasket that a family needs, but it doesn't consider all the other things that are inflating far, far faster than food prices.

I have no patience for those who say that poverty is a blessing. Poverty is the greatest curse on earth.

If you fall into poverty, live that way without grumbling - then your poverty will not burden you. Likewise, if you are rich, live with your riches. All this is the functioning of Buddha-nature. In short, Buddha-nature has the quality of infinite adaptability.

My mom grew up in poverty in Oklahoma - like Dust Bowl, nine people in one room kind of place - and the way she got out of poverty was through education. My dad grew up without a dad, with very little and he also made his way out through education.

Poverty is a scorpion; it stings the poor and it also stings the men with high conscience who feel sad about the poverty; the rest is immune to it!

You can't lift people out of poverty simply by tweaking the tax system, or by raising the minimum wage by a few cents, or by reducing student debt slightly. These might be necessary components of a larger anti-poverty program, but you have to accept they are pieces of a much larger puzzle.

We believe that poverty does not belong in a civilized human society. It belongs in museums [...] A poverty-free world might not be perfect, but it would be the best approximation of the ideal.

There's an awful lot of white British kids who have never really gone hungry, always had a roof to live under but at the same time are desperately unhappy. It's not total poverty, just a poverty of ideas.

...Poverty in America today leads not only to anxiety, unhappiness, discomfort and a lack of material goods. It leads to death. Poverty in America today is a death sentence for tens and tens of thousands of our people.

In the developed countries there is a poverty of intimacy, a poverty of spirit, of loneliness, of lack of love. There is no greater sickness in the world today than that one.

When I pick up a person from the street, hungry, I give him a plate of rice, a piece of bread. But a person who is shut out, who feels unwanted, unloved, terrified, the person who has been thrown out of society - that spiritual poverty is much harder to overcome. And abortion, which often follows from contraception, brings a people to be spiritually poor, and that is the worst poverty and the most difficult to overcome.

In opposition to this detachment, he finds an image of man which contains within itself man's dreams, man's illness, man's redemption from the misery of poverty - poverty which can no longer be for him a sign of the acceptance of life.

Few things in this world more trouble people than poverty, or the fear of poverty; and, indeed, it is a sore affliction; but, like all other ills that flesh is heir to, it has its antidote, its reliable remedy. The judicious application of industry, prudence and temperance is a certain cure.

The deeper we grow in the Spirit of Jesus Christ, the poorer we become - the more we realize that everything in life is a gift. The tenor of our lives becomes one of humble and joyful thanksgiving. Awareness of our poverty and ineptitude causes us to rejoice in the gift of being called out of darkness into wondrous light and translated into the kingdom of God's beloved Son.

The problem the world faces today is that only one-third of the world's population lives in decent circumstances, while half the population of the world lives on one or two dollars a day. And even as we have this poverty and backwardness, we are facing a global environmental crisis. We need developmental models that will take into account the specific and unique position of each country and at the same time will address the environmental crisis.

A lot of people don't know the culture shock of how you can be in a rich area and then be in poverty. People don't know how different it is over there.

Poverty is a stubborn thing: you seldom escape it with one bound.

I am poor and feeble, persecuted and vulnerable, Yeshua conquered me, and with the New Man he honored me, He delivered me from the poverty-stricken self with his great love, he cherishes me.

Poverty, to be picturesque, should be rural. Suburban misery is as hideous as it is pitiable.

Being in Marin City was like a small town so it taught me to be more [straightforward] with my style. Instead of of being so metaphorical with the rhyme, I was encouraged to go straight at it and hit it dead on and not waste time trying to cover thingsIn Marin City it seemed like things were real country. Everything was straightforward. Poverty was straightforward.

Focusing your life solely on making a buck shows a poverty of ambition. It asks too little of yourself. And it will leave you unfulfilled.

Managing your money does not depend upon becoming wealthy or declaring vows of poverty. Rather, it is about creating stability and sufficiency - a balanced flow of monetary energy through your life.

What we are fighting isn't godlessness--this is the most godly country on earth. We aren't even fighting disease. Its poverty. Money for food, medicines... that helps. When we cannot cure or save a life, our patients can at least feel cared for. It should be a basic human right.

The prevalent fear of poverty among the educated classes is the worst moral disease from which our civilization suffers.

In fact, every place I've been to in Africa has a nice part, but you see the downside. Calcutta , parts of Central and South America , I've seen a lot of dead bodies and a lot of sad poverty and just obliteration.

Gold gives an appearance of beauty even to ugliness: But with poverty everything becomes frightful.

Poverty is not simply having no money - it is isolation, vulnerability, humiliation and mistrust.

The biggest fight in my life is not in boxing. The biggest fight in my life is how to end poverty in my country.

The first world is going to have to account for this sort of horrible poverty in our midst. We have to, first of all, become aware of it. We have to take responsibility for it. And then we have to do something about it for our own freedom, for our own salvation, for our own humanity.

The first and foremost priority is to finish the unfinished task which the founding fathers of India set out for us at the time of our independence: to get rid of chronic poverty, ignorance, and disease, which have afflicted millions and millions of our people.

Only that which lasts forever is real. That which is done in the temple lasts forever; therefore, the temple is the real world. Most of what we experience "out there," such as sickness, wealth, poverty, fame, etc., lasts for only a short period of time, so it is not the real world.

There can be no freedom for Africa without justice; and no justice without declaring war on Africa's poverty, disease and famine with as much vehemence as we remove the tyrant and the terrorist.