Several weeks ago, my brother-in-law emailed an opinion piece from The New York Times titled What Makes People Poor? by Thomas B. Edsall. Considering my post about our current economy, the Edsall piece has provoked added reflection for me.
A simple Google search on “poverty” produces websites and articles in abundance. At least one offers mind-numbing statistics on worldwide poverty. Those facts alone are enough to depress anyone. But Professor Edsall’s thoughts don’t bog down with stats. He attempts to present the “discussion of poverty as a technical problem, not a moral one.”
The kernel of Edsall’s piece (as I understand it) is to call for “ideological convergence [that] could produce a more empirically grounded understanding of the causes of poverty and of social and economic inequality as well.” Even though analysis (on both left and right) tends to be somewhat complementary, he blames “political polarization” for preventing a desired synthesis. Continue reading “Blessed Are the Poor”