I want to clarify that this is an essay for practice, not a response to the events in Haiti. Anything said here should not be taken seriously as part of my political ideologies.
Spending money on the poor is a matter of hollow hope. If providing housing or welfare accomplishes anything, it is lifting the spirits of the weak to be further crushed. In a collection of economic and philosophical studies provided, but not created by, Santa Clara University, the existence of the lower class is an inherent part of our legal system. The entire legal system, the studies state, is based on being able to classify and verbally oppress this lower class. As a result, the only method to ridding America of poverty is scrapping law across the nation [Santa Clara]. Furthermore, even if throwing this bone to the poor may benefit a few, that money or land can be used by the economically strong. Philosopher John Stuart Mill's Utilitarianism emphasizes the maximizing the chances of the best outcome. If the criterion is wealth, a few pennies given to the poor is certainly insignificant compared to that same money becoming dollars in the hands of the rich. Certainly, this would not mean the death of the poor. After all, killing the lower class removes a significant part of society and lowers the middle class. But as John Steinbeck demonstrates in his The Grapes of Wrath, the rich may or may not help the poor, but the real responsibility of helping those desperate families like the Joads falls upon other poor families like those in the camp or on the road [Steinbeck]. If poverty is to be solved, it just cannot be through the government. Having people fall below the poverty line is a fact of life, but having those in the highest classes is a blessing of society that is not constantly limited by the nature of poverty.
In the world of economics, there may indeed exist a "rock bottom", but no other extreme exists. Being able to maximize that extreme is the main purpose of all human entities. In the political analysis of the German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche's The Will to Power, governments serve as entities whose purpose is to maximize the success of their members. Ideally, human society becomes like a pride of lions, each individually powerful and each strong. However, through the "moral responsibility" of governments to help the poor, human society is more like thousands of rats, weak and filled with disease. The dollar that becomes a hundred pennies for the poor can be the fifty dollars that becomes part of the research that cures cancer or the dollar that pays for a few bullets that uphold democracy. Similarly, in the Malthusian mind, the poverty line is more of a population check that serves to ensure that only the strongest succeed and provide a clean solution to an overpopulation of competition in the large capitalist markets. Such overpopulation can lead to a collapse of the economy, and thus a depression where everyone is poor. Even if wealth is not in direct relation to ability or power, any competent peasant should be able to squeeze through this poverty line without any help [Malthus]. Helping the poor is not a viable choice presented to human society, but optimizing human values is.
When a lion kills something, there is nothing "moral" for it to give it up to the flies. Most flies that hatch will not survive for a purpose, but there are so many. If for some reason, every lion got together to decide to feed the flies, they would go extinct. Helping the poor is a luxury governments cannot afford. Human nature dictates that we have ambitions, but it also dictates that we feel compassion. Governments are manifestations of our ambitions and we cannot weigh it down with our compassion.
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