The University of Memphis The Charitable Industrial Complex Response

Student 1 paris

1) Peter Buffett-“The Charitable-Industrial Complex”  

Question: Do all people want to solve poverty for the same reasons?

Answer: All people do not want to solve poverty for the same reasons. We are all diverse human beings with differentiating thought patterns and actions. However, I believe there are two main categories that people fit into in regard to solving poverty. There are people that want to solve poverty because they sincerely care for their fellow human beings, and there are other people that want to solve poverty for their own sake and ego. There are many other reasons that people may want to solve poverty outside these categories, but I think these two are among the most prominent

Student 2 knoledge

.Karlan and Appel “Are good intentions enough to alleviate poverty?”- Although intentioned people can and have proven helpful in getting people out of poverty I think their overall an unreliable method o alleviating poverty on the large scale. The thing about good intentions is that everyone has a different interpretation of what a good deed is and that can lead to money and resources going to the wrong causes if any that actually reduce poverty. One example that comes to mind is Tom’s Shoe company which used to donate a pair of shoes to a developing nation for every pair bought in the states. To the average consumer, they would think purchasing Tom’s shoes to be a charitable act, giving shoes to the poor but in many cases, the influx of donated shoes could hurt the local economy by eliminating the need for local shoe sellers and shoemakers. Also, the people in the areas donated to were/are in more need of things like clean running water, medicine, food, and most importantly a growing economy than they need free shoes. This isn’t to say that the people who bought those shoes are bad people’s good intentions can be manipulated in such a way that they think what their doing is fixing the problem but it actually isn’t.