Effects of poverty

The endless list

Trying to explain the effects of poverty would require a whole book (or simply reading the whole
website hehe), so in this page youll first find a very non- exhaustive list of effects, after what Ill
dwell more into some of the effects that are related to the social impact of poverty. While issues
like hunger, illness and thirst can be considered both causes and effects of poverty (I dont have
water so Im poor, and since Im poor I cant afford water), theyre also a characteristic of
poverty, they define it. You can therefore also refer to the page on the causes of poverty to
complete the picture.
Just as the causes of poverty are often interrelated, so are
the effects of poverty. Bad sanitation makes it easier to
spread around old and new diseases, and hunger and
lack of water make people more vulnerable to them.
Impoverished communities often suffer from
discrimination and so get caught in cycles of poverty that
create long lasting problems and handicaps passed on
from one generation to another: not attending school, child labor to help the parents, lack of
education on basic hygiene, transmission of diseases, etc.
Unemployment, another major ingredient for creating poverty, and insufficient revenues create
an environment where kids are not driven to or can't simply go to school, and the resulting lack
of education generates more unemployment. And so on, and so on

Environment
There is no proof that poverty, especially in cities, has an impact on the environment. On the
other hand, backward (or not so developed) technologies and an industrys energy efficiency
(how much energy it needs to produce an amount of goods) will greatly affect the environment.
But at large, the middle- and upper-classes lifestyles are also greatly responsible for the
depletion of natural resources and the production of (sometimes highly toxic) waste. Or at
least lifestyles based on over-consumption are the true responsible, which is often disregarded
in public debates (as humans it is kind of hard to resist to so much temptation).
If there is any common association of poverty with the environment, it's probably because of
those pictures of children running around in waste dumps. But the link between any effects of
poverty and the environment is not there, quite the opposite: those toxic places prove very
harmful to the poor, who actually tend to reuse, recycle or resell whatever they can find in there.
Good governance and good management of resources remains the best way to tackle both
problems of environment and poverty. Its in fact quite ironic that thanks to poverty and the very

low levels of consumption it implies, the extent of the damage done to the environment and the
depletion of natural resources have been relatively limited. Its only with the rise of China, India
and other BRICS that rich countries have started worrying about limited resources for everyone
and problems of over-consumption and energy efficiency.

Terrorism
Its become a commonplace in newspapers to blame poverty of fueling terrorism by creating a
state of misery and frustration that pushes people to join terrorist organizations. While this
doesnt seem a totally groundless accusation it makes sense and feeds the riches tormented
conscience more and more research shows that the effect of poverty on terrorism is not that
straightforward. Its important to note however that most of the time terrorists do come from
poorer countries with high unemployment, and that terrorist organizations often provide much
higher salaries than any other job, if any other job is available at all.
In fact, a lot of different factors interact with the decision to become a terrorist. Personal and
cultural ideals, values, and principles are just as important as material and social gain (reputation
& fame for fighting the imperialists) of entering terrorism. Not only that but it seems very low
levels of education and wealth do not drive people to join a terrorist movement. It may
sound counter-intuitive, but if you think about it for a minute, the very poor and uneducated
usually:
- Do not know about the outside world, or have extremely limited knowledge of it. So how could
they be angry at how the rich live? Their decadent lifestyle, as much in terms of consumption
as in terms of liberal behaviour. A good deal of arrested (or identified) terrorists had often been
students in European universities or elsewhere.
- Are illiterate. Given the extent of manipulation and ideological indoctrination, people usually
need some educational basis to understand it. In the case of Islamism, one would need to know
literary Arabic in order to understand the Quran, or the special version/interpretation they use.
Literary Arabic is a very elaborated language and often said of great beauty and poetry. Not
something that everyone can grasp, even for a commented, or weirdly interpreted version of the
Quran. Problem with most ancient languages is their hazy-misty style that, if you ignore the
context and original way of thinking, makes anyone free of interpreting them the way they want.
So terrorism isnt a direct and solid effect of poverty, and it usually implies a minimum of
education. What then is the source of frustration and anger? Studies have showed that countries
with weak governments, institutions and personal civil rights are a great environment to
nurture the production of terrorists. In countries undergoing a profound transition (e.g. from
authoritarian to democratic regime), this sort of political instability often comes along with a
blurring of rules and laws. These periods of change come with a transformation of the social
order, values, ways of doing things that can become very distressing and unsettling for the
people.

Its in such moments that the craziest rumors, cults and other conspiracy theories best spread
around. In Arabic countries its about the taking over of the world by American Jews, in the US
(following the 9/11 for example) its about the government itself. Rumors appear to reassure
people in thinking that there is still an order of things, and that all things are in fact under
somebodys control rather than just out of control. You could call this a poverty of stability.
An unforeseen effect of poverty on peoples minds or mental resistance to change. The most
insane cults have likewise spread like fire in post-soviet Russia and other countries in transition.
Stabilizing and empowering political institutions is therefore a crucial aspect of fighting against
all effects of poverty.

Child poverty
Ever since the 1960s, the share of children affected by poverty has only got bigger and bigger.
Children are those who have the least choice and ability to change what happens to them. There
isnt much they can do to help their families, nor should they have to. Until they can stand firmly
on their two legs, usually by the age of 6, then they can be enrolled willynilly in child labor.
Nearly all possible effects of poverty have an impact on children lives.
Poor infrastructures, unemployment, lack of basic services and income
reflect on their lack of education, malnutrition, violence at home and
outside, child labor, diseases of all kinds, transmitted by the family or
through the environment.
Click here to read more about children in poverty
Click here to read more about child labor
Children antisocial behavior
One of the effects of poverty on childrens development is to lead them to build an antisocial
behavior that acts as a psychological protection against their hostile environment. Discrimination
and social exclusion often push them to more aggressiveness and less self-control and nuance in
reaction to stressful events. Having often been taken advantage of in their early childhood, they
rarely come to a constructive way to deal with conflicts.
As they grow up, these behaviors are more and more entrenched in their personalities and often
considered unrecoverable. This highlights the importance of taking action as early as possible to
improve childrens living conditions. Policymakers should understand that not just income but a
childs social environment at large (parenting, school violence, housing, but also sanitation,
uncontaminated food and water) play a big role in creating new effects of poverty.

Poverty and crime

Crime varies over time and space. Its high in specific areas and low in others, most of the time
those that are poor or rich. This has always led experts to study why and what happens in those
places where there is a concentration of crime. Its unquestionable that crime ranks high among
the effects of poverty, and those impoverished neighborhoods or entire cities show the same
problems with uneducated labor nurturing more unemployment and crime, and then leading
to chronic, long lasting poverty.
But to solve these issues, its fundamental to have a more detailed and in-depth vision of the
poverty cycle here, and what the precise effects of poverty on crime are in different communities
and environments. For example its been proved that unemployment is a bigger factor for
specific types of crime than income inequality is. Low incomes on the other side tend to spur
property-related crimes (burglary and all that) but reduce violence. Overall studies have shown
very different effects of poverty, for different types of poverty: from income inequalities, to
social exclusion and unemployment.
Click here to read more about poverty and crime

Women and poverty

If in absolute terms (i.e. the most basic needs) less women live in poverty than fifty years ago, in
general there has been an increasing share of women in the proportion of people living in
poverty (aka feminization of poverty). This is yet another of the clear-cut effects of poverty. The
trend toward more single-parent families has only made things worse and women have become
more and more vulnerable to their environment. They find themselves forced to feed the poverty
cycle by living in poverty with their children.
Almost everywhere in the world, women are segregated, have very limited access to
education (for political, religious or social reasons) and are sometimes forbidden to work or
restricted to tedious ones. There are obvious (political & social) interests in keeping women in
this state, and its always recommended when fighting against poverty to start with empowering
women in every possible way to solve a great deal of problems. Being the cornerstone of the
family, women can have a great impact not only on the household income, but also on the
education of children (including sanitation), and avoiding early child deaths due to bad habits,
sanitation or improper food or water.

Social exclusion and health

As you saw it in the discussion on absolute poverty, a universal and simple measure of poverty is
to look at different populations health and life expectancy. Its no surprise that anywhere on
earth, poorer communities fare worse than richer ones. But people's health is affected not only by

material poverty but also by social exclusion, yet another neglected effect of poverty. This is all
the more true of ethnic minorities in whichever country, where theyre often the first groups to
suffer from discrimination and unfair treatments. This implies that the effects of poverty are not
exclusively material but also very much psychological (it affects in many ways mental health and
behavior).
This aspect of mental and physiological health is present in each and every of the
aforementioned effects of poverty. Every form of poorness, every form of social exclusion be
it material or racial has its impact on peoples health. This has massive consequences for
policymakers concerned not just about poverty but also about reinforcing social cohesion. The
nation-building effort should now shift from nationalism, to uniting a people around a society
that represents and acts on a common set of values. In particular, a society that nurtures an
environment that will help all of its citizens to best use or develop news skills, to best express
their potential and participate in the development of the society. An enabling and empowering
society (thats what experts and politicians often mean by those words).
http://www.poverties.org/effects-of-poverty.html