crazyheart
From Regina Leader Post this am - poverty
Posted on: 03/01/2011 12:03
the reality of poverty and its "dehumanizing" effects.
Angus Reid Public Opinion conducted the poll in late January, with 1,025 Canadians included.
The results carry a margin of error of 3.1 percentage points, 19 times out of 20.
SELECTED RESULTS FROM THE DIGNITY PROJECT REPORT:
- 49 per cent of Canadians say if poor people really want to work, they can always find a job.
- 43 per cent agree that "a good work ethic is all you need you to escape poverty."
- 41 per cent say that if we gave poor people more assistance, they would "take advantage."
- 28 per cent believe people living in poverty "usually have lower moral values."
- 23 per cent believe people are poor because they're lazy.
- 37 per cent agree that people living in poverty in Canada "still have it pretty good."
- 24 per cent say they don't really see many people in Canada who are "truly poor."
- 18 per cent say poverty is a problem we can't really do much about.
Read more: http://www.leaderpost.com/business/Poverty+myths+rampant+report/4363317/story.html#ixzz1FMlhFUJT
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crazyheart
Do the majority of canadians
Posted on: 03/01/2011 12:05
Do the majority of canadians really think like this?
graeme
I should think the real
Posted on: 03/01/2011 22:18
I should think the real figures would be even worse. Remember, a surprisingly high percentage of Canadians are not even functionally literate. And Canada is one of the best educated countries in the world. Things are much worse in the US. Thus a Sarah Palin becomes a presidential possibility, as well as a foreigh and economic affairs expert for Fox News.
Imagine what things are like in the rest of the world.
graeme
And where did those
Posted on: 03/01/2011 22:25
And where did those statistics about "most" people come from?
spiritbear
I think the poll results show
Posted on: 03/01/2011 23:31
I think the poll results show the kind of stratified society we live in. I suspect that most people who say that jobs are readily available for all harbour this kind of distorted view of reality because they don't know someone who has lost a job because their plant was outsourced to China, or they got sick or became disabled, or had their marriages break down etc. Think what must be going through their minds: "No one I know at work is unemployed, so what's the problem?" Until it strikes you, of course.
Elanorgold
I know people who think like
Posted on: 03/02/2011 00:30
I know people who think like this. They are kidding themselves. They look down from their shiney temples and think I must have done something wrong, I was lazy, I was irresponsible, I'm not as smart, not as good. Bull !!!
I just had a job interview for a minimum wage job last tuesday and didn't get it. Kinda upsetting.
The worst thing about poverty I have found is the daily stress and fear about where we'll be in the next few months. JK Rowling said, "It's not enobling". No it's not. It's bloody bad for yer health! I've been poorer though. I still have internet and a half decent car! ...and house foundations that aren't crumbling like our last house! (Before that it was a drippy moldy appartment folks.) We're goin' places!
Interesting stats Crazyheart. Thanks.
seeler
49 percent think that if poor
Posted on: 03/02/2011 06:21
49 percent think that if poor people want to work they can find a job -
Consider, many of these people are children and youth, or over 50, many are in poor health, including mental health, many have elementary school education. and many are already working at one or to jobs that combined do not pay enough to lift their family out of poverty - and that many better educated people, better skilled people have been laid off during downturns in the economy and jobs are just not available. 48% think that they could find jobs if they wanted to!!!! Lets get realistic.
43 % think that a 'good work ethics ' is all you need. See above. No one will know if you have a good work ethic if you can't find a job in the first place. And a good work ethic when all you can find is wiping off tables or gathering grocery carts at the mall isn't going to get you into a position where you will be able to support yourself. A call centre has 300 employees and only ten supervisors. How long do you have to have a good work ethic at a call centre to move up, or to avoid lay off when the entire business closes and moves to India.
41 % think that if we gave more assistance the poor would 'take advantage'. I'm surprised its not higher. Of course they would 'take advantage'. They might move to a more suitable place to live than their overcrowded basement room. They might put more nourishing food on the table. They might sign their kids up for swimming lessons, or allow them to attend a birthday party and take a gift, they might even buy an outfit of clothes and get their hair cut and go out and look for a job.
seeler
28% believe that the poor
Posted on: 03/02/2011 07:21
28% believe that the poor have low moral values - but is it the poor that fly to the philipines to sexually exploit the child slave workers in the philipines, or who invet their money in huge mining operations that not only displace thousands of people, but who polute the land and sea, or who transfer whole companies from Canada to India to avoid paying decent wages or government taxes or to escape laws calling for polution controls and safety standards. Let's define 'morality' before we through accusations?
23% believe that people are poor because they are lazy - or young, or sick, or old, or eneducated, or unskilled, or are taking care of dependants (see above). And maybe they aren't lazy at all. Maybe it actually takes more energy and more drive totry to provide for you family on poverty wages, than on a comfortable salalry. And maybe its harder to work the morning shift at a breakfast joint, change and hurry to cover the noon-hour shift at the drycleaning outlet, and then after a two hour compute finish your day standing on you feet at Walmort. And still ending up under the poverty line.
37 % think that people on poverty have it pretty good, and 24% don't see any really poor people. Correct that - volunteer at the soup kitchen for a month and watch the people come in (including families with children), volunteer at the food bank and make up boxes for people who can't feed their families, or try to find some way to check the places some of these people live and try to keep warm, and clean, and raise their children to do well in school and sociiety. True, only a few in Canada dig through garbage bins - but they do exist right here. Employees at fast food stores get used to hereing 'when do you put your trash out?' and even some employees are eyeing those burgers that are just past their shelf life.
graeme
I was born into pretty
Posted on: 03/02/2011 12:35
I was born into pretty serious poverty. I don't think my parents were lazy. My father worked in a factory for a very smal and unreliable wage, He also used slack days when the factory didn't need him to shovel snow for the city. And he walked several miles each night to get free milk for me. We still barely survived. Illness was unheard of because we couldn't afford it.
To this day, I detest self-righeous asses who pronounce on the failings of the poor.
Jim Kenney
I see the fundamental problem
Posted on: 03/02/2011 13:33
I see the fundamental problem here as supporting stereotypes about people, including the ones who supported particular opinions. One of them is the confusion between being poor and being unemployed -- Beshpin just bought into this one. My sister has worked for fast food outlets for the last 11 years, including the last 4 at a Tim Hortons. Lately her shift starts at 4:30 am and finishes at any time from 8:30 to noon, depending on the whim of her employer who has just hired a large number of workers from the Philippines through a program sponsored by the federal government. The workers from the Philippines are guaranteed 44 hours a week; the other workers, like my sister, have had their hours reduced as a result. If she wasn't living with our mother, she would not be able to survive economically.
The issues around poverty are complex and I am glad that over 50% of Canadians undestand that -- a great improvement over the last few years.
graeme
Beshpin likes a balanced view
Posted on: 03/03/2011 10:35
Beshpin likes a balanced view of holding prejudices in pairs. He could have skipped the self-praise of going to school full time and haveing a job full time. Save the malarkey. I did the same thing, It's no big deal.
Jim Kenney
Beshpin, the thread was about
Posted on: 03/03/2011 17:54
Beshpin, the thread was about a survey about people's attitudes towards poor people -- When you posted about working and going to school full time, it appeared to me as an example of those people who assume poor people are unemployed.
I do agree that there are people on welfare or are living on the streets who are there because they don't like working, or just simply exploitive. There are many issues related to poverty from tax cuts for the wealthy and repressive labour laws through health issues to intergenerational attitudes and habits to simple lazy self-centeredness and inclinations to commit fraud.
The most interesting aspect to this survey and some of the posts is the inclination of people to focus on the negative, even when it is in a small minority.