Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by motters 3754 days ago
"If you live here, even if you are the poorest person in the country, you are rich beyond the dreams of half the population of the world"

Really? Have you ever been in The Work Programme? Have you ever visited a food bank? Have you ever had neighbours pleading with you for food for their children because they have no money? You can prefer to live inside of a cosy bubble of ignorance if you wish, but this is the UK in 2016.

1 comments

The answer to all of your questions is approximately yes (names vary). I've also done a lot of work to address these problems when they come up, and I've read the data on the current state of the economy. How many of these things have you done?

Have you ever had people pleading with you for food/money and, instead of berating people on the internet, got them into the drugs treatment programme that they desperately needed? Have you ever got people to correctly file appeals when the jobcentre made a mistake and didn't give them the money they were entitled to? Have you ever taught people the skills they need to be productive members of society and provide for themselves?

Because I've also done all of those things on multiple occasions, and I think I have a much better sense of the problems that we face than you do. I also think that your refusal to admit these are the real problems and put work into fixing them is one of the major reasons why we still have them. It's very easy to say "I want more, it's not fair", and much harder to figure out why things aren't working when there's plenty for everybody and get something done about that.