Absolute and Relative Poverty

Absolute and Relative Poverty

In between the years 1978 and 1980 politics from all over the world came together to see if they could help the world's poverty. A man called Willy Brandt the groups chairman wrote an introduction saying:

'Our report is based on what appears to be the simplest common interest. Mankind wants to survive and, one might even add, has the moral obligations to survive. This not only raises the traditional questions of peace and war, but also how to over come world hunger, mass misery and alarming differences between the living conditions of rich and poor ... we want to emphasize our belief that the two decades ahead of us maybe fateful to mankind'
(North-South: A Programme for Survival, 1980)

The best way to show how the world divides into rich and poor is the North-South line. In the North part of the equator (including Australia) are the rich, or developed countries; these countries include North America, Europe, Russia, Japan, Australia and New Zealand. In the southern part of the equator indicates the poor, or Third World countries (also known as underdeveloped or developing countries). These countries are most of Asia, Africa and Latin America.
Here are a few facts and figures about the differences in the two sectors:

North
* 25% of the world population,
* Earns 80% of the world's income,
* A person is averaged to live up to or more than 70 years,
* Most people are educated at a primary or secondary school,
* Over 90% of the worlds manufacturing industry,
* About 96% of the world's spending on research and development,
* It dominates most of the international economic system and institutions of trade, money and finance.

South
* 75% of the world's population,
* Earns 20% of the world's income,
* A person is averaged to live up to 50 years,
* 20% or more people suffer from hunger and malnutrition.
* 50% of the people don't have a chance of getting a formal education.

In the Third World countries most people live in 'Absolute Poverty'. Here is a quote of a definition of 'Absolute Poverty':

'A condition of life so characterized by malnutrition, illiteracy, disease, high mortality rate and low life expectancy as to be beneath any reasonable definition of human decency'
(Robert Macnamara)

Absolute poverty is a trap in which nearly a fifth