What Have Poor People Ever Done For This Country?

So many in America call out the poor as "moochers" and the programs for them as unnecessary and even wasteful. They say having these "welfare programs" keep them poor and "enables" them to be and stay poor.

Being Sunday, I think it an especially good day to examine just what and who the poor are and what, exactly, they do.

What Have The Poor Ever Done For Us

1. They built it. The country was literally built on the backs of poor immigrants and slaves. To this day, construction workers are some of the hardest working people in the country, yet their average wage is only $50,000 per year, which includes management. People that maintain the roads driven by the wealthy (and everyone else) are paid only $30,000 per year.
2. They care for our children. The average nanny is paid only about $30,000 per year, usually without benefits.
3. They teach our children. The average teacher makes around $45,000 a year, which might not sound poor, but for that salary, most positions require advanced degrees.
4. They make the world beautiful. It would be difficult to determine the average salary of an artist, but very few of even the most talented artists achieve financial success.
5. They inform and entertain. Writers, actors and filmmakers are just as likely to live in poverty as visual artists.
6. They create. Inventors are often poorly paid for their inventions, if paid at all.
7. They are entrepreneurs. Two thirds of startup businesses fail. Many of them fail because they were simply out financed (think the big coffee chain moving on to the same corner as the independent coffee house).
8. They keep our world clean. People that do the dirtiest jobs are notoriously some of the least paid, yet can you imagine a world without people emptying our trash and cleaning our toilets?
9. They keep you alive. Without poor people, produce would rot in the fields. There would be no goods on the shelves. There would be no store clerks to sell them to you. Most Americans would most likely starve.
10. They fight for our country. The average starting salary of enlisted personnel is about $30,000 per year.
11. They save the world. Many of history’s most selfless people live their lives in or near poverty. They join the Peace Corps. They work for or start charitable organizations.
12. They pay their taxes. Much is made of the statistic that between 40 and 50 percent of people don’t pay federal income tax. That is typically because they are too poor. But even if they don’t pay federal income tax, they pay taxes. They pay Social Security taxes. They pay state taxes. They pay the identical sales tax on food and clothing as their wealthy brethren. They pay identical gasoline taxes as their more fortunate counterparts. Unlike the wealthy, taxes deeply impact the well being of the poor, yet, unlike the wealthy, they are unable to take advantage of the loopholes that were designed to specifically benefit the wealthy.

What have the poor ever done for this country?

Everything.

Of course, we can debate the definition of the word, “poor”, but the fact is that the gap between the people that have the most and the people that have the least is growing. People are not becoming less valuable. They are simply getting paid less.

Links:

U.S. inequality keeps getting uglier

Growing wealth inequality 'dangerous' threat to democracy: experts

Economic Inequality: It's Far Worse Than You Think - Scientific American