Poverty is only an Imbalance

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Poverty
is really only
Imbalance

This post is my bit for "blog action day" which this year aims to focus attention on POVERTY. I am posting a few days early rather than get caught the last minute. This post can also be classified as one of my rants, it is one rant I make no apology whatsoever for.


Balance

Chinese philosophy is greatly bound up with the idea of “balance”. The Yin Yang symbol is one of the most widespread logos in the world – it is all about balance of the opposites.

We live in a very imbalanced world, where half the 3 billion inhabitants live on less than $2 a day. Yet there are over 100 BILLIONAIRES (that is $1,000,000,000 in the bank) in the USA. And what do they spend their money on?

Get him a Gulfstream Jet with that spare $40 million

A private jet maybe the Gulfstream-V (G-V), which retails for around $40 million. One guy bought 13 separate ranches. It’s like Imelda Marcos and her thousands of pairs of shoes – how many can you wear at any time?

Perfect for a Rich Prick

And then there are the not so mega rich that just want to lord it over everyone else and act the complete prick - the rich low-lifes that will happily buy a $1000 programme for the iPhone that does nothing except say they are rich – I have a feeling that God does not easily forgive this sort of prodigal son!

Nearly a third of the world’s population (1 billion people) are unable to read a book or sign their names. Yet - less than 1% of what is spent on weapons of war and destruction would educate every child in the world. 29,000+ children under 5 years of age affected by poverty die every day.


Betting shops for the rich.

In a way I am very happy to see the world economic crisis happening. It is, I hope, a salutary lesson to the financial world that it needs to consider adopting a strict code of ethics and morals. Greed, and nothing but greed, has caused this world crisis. Greedy banks, greedy equity markets, greedy individuals - no apologies offered to anyone!!!

Think about this: The rich and the super-rich betting on the price of an essential commodity can cause poor people to die of hunger - I wonder if these speculators or their agents could ever be tried for murder?


The Great Wall of China.

Shanghai skyline makes Manhattan look cheap

China today is a good example of a society which is going quickly into serious imbalance. On the one hand you have China emerging as the new high-power economy and making a big splash with the Olympics. The skylines in some of China’s cities these days make Manhattan look cheap.

China's Bang Bang Hotels are not 5 Star!!!

But China has a very dark underbelly and is IMHO heading fast down the road towards yet another revolution. China’s runaway economy is built on the back of some of the most serious and unjust social imbalance anywhere in our world.

Super-rich and super-poor live on the same patch. The haves have it all – while the Bang-Bang men or migrant workers live in appalling slums, without rights, medical care, insurance, or even basic safety where they work for a pittance.

Yin Yang and the Great Wall now Dividing China

China and the rest of the world may be forced to seek a better balance, the financial crisis now gripping the world is a symptom of the disease. There is a fair chance that the patient could die if the balance of Yin and Yang is not redressed sometime soon.

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