Dead to statistics.
September 2nd, 2009 | Published in Economics idea | 5 Comments
Another reason why well-off people might not care much about the plight of the poor is how we respond to overwhelming problems and statistics.
If a child falls down a well and is trapped, it catches our interest. It is a specific child down the well. The emotion and concern of the child’s family are palpable. The rescue effort has an achievable goal that can completely solve the problem. We emotionally respond to stories like this in the news. We may even crack open our wallets and send money to aid the rescue effort. When the child is eventually save, we all feel a visceral sense of relief.
If we respond to the plight of one child trapped in a well, you would think we would be enormously concerned about problems of starvation and malnutrition that afflict millions in poor countries. In general we are not. Instead of responding to the situation, we ignore it.
The problem is that the scale is too big. We can’t visualize millions of starving people. The problem is so large that we can’t envision a solution. The problem lacks a compelling narrative. With nothing to engage us on a human scale, it is easier to rationalize the problem away. We convince ourselves that the world is a cruel place. It’s sad, but nothing can be done.
Maybe what I need to do to drive home the need to flatten income distributions is to find some compelling stories about the problems specific poor people face.
September 2nd, 2009 at 3:10 pm (#)
Good thought, Stephen. I think it’s true on a local level too. I generally ignore panhandlers. Some of them would get great value if I gave them $1 and they went to buy food. I wouldn’t mind that as $1 is of less value to me. But I’m not going to walk around all day looking for people to give $1 to. How could I justify helping one person and ignoring another who is just as needy? And many of them will spend the dollar on alcohol or drugs. So to save myself the effort of evaluating each situation, I just ignore them all.
Eric
September 3rd, 2009 at 12:09 pm (#)
Eric.
How do you feel when you walk past a homeless person begging for change?
I feel sorry for them and empathize with the hardship they are enduring. This, for me, is balanced by anger at the whole concept of begging. Why should I have to run a gauntlet of people asking for money every time I walk down the street?
For me, it isn’t a matter of effort, it is purely an emotional response. Empathy and anger battle it out and anger usually wins.
September 3rd, 2009 at 3:15 pm (#)
Stephen,
There are quite a lot of beggers who do not “get in your face” or actively ask for money – they have a sign or some other means to passively convey their situation and request for money. I don’t think this category of beggers would anger you – why don’t you give them money?
Eric
September 4th, 2009 at 12:50 pm (#)
Eric.
Maybe anger is too strong a word.
I think the problem I have with pan handling is that they play on my emotions. I feel guilty ignoring their pleas for money when I clearly have plenty of money. I then resent them for making me feel guilty. The problem is that I haven’t resolved exactly how much I should be giving to charity. I have a nagging feeling that I should do more. Most of the time, these feelings are out of sight and out of mind. The pan handlers bring it up to the surface.
The other thing that bothers me with pan handlers is that if you give them money it just encourages them to keep doing what they are doing. If giving them money would help them somehow turn their lives around so they wouldn’t have to beg anymore, I’d be more likely to give. Instead, giving them money makes begging for change a viable path to follow indefinitely.
September 4th, 2009 at 4:51 pm (#)
Another aspect of this is that I think you’re correct that the problem of starvation in Africa is too big, so people will individually ignore it, rightly or wrongly. However, the problem of an individual pan-handler is NOT too big. You could easily give 10% of your income to an individual pan-handler and greatly increase his standard of living. Maybe he’d even turn his life around and contribute more to society.
My question to those who are passionate about standards of living around the world is: Why don’t you take the first step and sacrifice some of your standard of living to help raise up one person? And if you contribute something to charity every year, why don’t you contribute more?
I think those who don’t are being intellectually dishonest on some level about how much they care about other people.
Eric