The R Word

Purple poverty is a complex issue. You arguing that it is a social and not economic problem is pretty spurious. As any serious analysis of poverty would suggest that the causes of poverty and both social and economic, in fact they both factors are intertwined.

You talk about equality of oppurtunity as opposed to equality, but the problem with this is the untimate rationale for equality of oppurtunity is if fact EQUALITY. Or at least giving poor people the chance to have a life where they will be comfortable, understand the value of education, good health, being an active citizen etc.

generational poverty will not be solved by your "get on your bike" solution to the poor. You say you come from an area where there was poverty, yet your attitude towards the poor is one of simplistic blame. This is a real shame as it people like you that could offer important insights into the complexity. Yet you choose to settle for "Johnny blue" jibes as a way of undermining issues assciated with poverty.

Equality of oppurtunity, yes we all aggree this is the best we can strive for. Yet it is a fact that privatisation education will do nothing to bridge the gap between of oppurtunity between the rich and poor. It will further widen the gap.

Let me give you an example, I have worked on the Trinity Access programme. It aims to get students from socioeconomically deprived areas the chance to go to college. However even with the best supports avalible for these kids, i.e. extra tuition, grants, etc it is very difficult to fit in to the student body at large. See the other students have developed a life of cultural and social capitial and networks etc. And these kids do not want to share cultural and social capitial with kids from clondalkin or finglas. (Now I am not saying that kids from clondalkin do not go to trinity etc on thier own merits and get on great, but this is very rare and these kids have to fight against very subtle but very real prejudices.) These prejudices exist against the poor everywhere, and manifiest themselves in the simplictic "blame the poor its thier own fault" rethoric to more overt and insedious forms of descrimination.
 
Television - purple and uiop come from a poor background and have expressed their opinions. Surely these are the people the government should be listening to? Unless you come from a poor background yourself and are offering your opinions based on that experience?
 

I think it was John Drennan who once criticised a Labour Party politician as someone "who would be happier talking to the Combat Poverty Agency than to the poor"
 
Just to let you know the two main methods of calculating poverty rates in Ireland.

The first is "at-risk-of-poverty". As the name implies, this means you are not necessarily suffering, but you do have a low income, so any negative event could cause you major difficulties.

Also known as relative income poverty, as you have a low income relative to everybody else.

How is this calculated?

See the relevant CSO publication:
[broken link removed]

What they do is estimate the disposable income per equivalised person, then they get 60% of it, and set this as the "poverty line". If your disp income is below this, then you are "at-risk-of-poverty".

Net disp household income = 834.44
Net disp income per person = 406.84

60% of median equivalised disp income = 202.49

17% of people are under this threshold, that is our rate of relative poverty.
 
Please read my posts again, I said that the primary cause was social. Of course economic issues factor in the equation.

I agree completely. My point is that you cannot give people a nebulous form of equality, you can only give them equal access to the tools which offer them the chance to have the life they want.

It’s not that complex. Some people are happy to live for the now and not build a better life for themselves and their children. Others want more. What the state needs to do in help to instil that desire for betterment in children when their parents fail to do so. The programme you were part of in Jobstown is just the sort of thing we need more of. By the way I smoked Johnny Blue for years so it was more a David McWilliams style label than a jibe. I have outlined the sort of pandering to middle income voters, dresses up as an initiative to help the poor, that annoys me.

television said:
Equality of oppurtunity, yes we all aggree this is the best we can strive for. Yet it is a fact that privatisation education will do nothing to bridge the gap between of oppurtunity between the rich and poor. It will further widen the gap.
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As long as the state funds access for the poor it doesn’t matter who provides the education.

I am familiar with the Trinity outreach programme and thing it is a great idea but the majority of the funding needs to go into early primary school education (and in fairness a lot does). I have outlined how I think funding should be targeted for students like the one in your example rather than spread around to people (like me) who don’t really need it. Don’t get me wrong, sending my kids to third level without state funding would not be easy but I could do it with planning and time.


True equality will never exist as there will always be some level of bias, nepotism, racism etc in society but again the root cause is not an economic one. Giving people things that they are capable of providing for themselves does not solve the problem; it perpetuates it.
 
I'm not sure of the effectiveness of these access programmes. People from these areas have attended Trinity even before these access programmes were in place. Like uiop they knuckled down and studied in school when other kids were off doing whatever. When in college, they worked part time to fund themselves. However, in recent years, the Trinity Access programme tries to justify its existance by saying that these kids are the product of its work rather that the reality is that these kids would have got there anyway. One friend of mine - his younger brother went to TCD post the introduction of this programme and was labelled as one of its success stories. However, like his older brother, he would have gone anyway under his own steam.
 
Note that our rate is relatively high compared to other EU countries.

See here:

[broken link removed]

Also note that relative income poverty can never be 0%.
 
You can count me as number 3 along with Purple & Uiop. Though not from a family of systemic unemployment, neither of my parents had much formal education. My father worked for 40 years in relatively low paid employment (and experienced being laid off in the 80s recession). A lot of kids I went to school with had unemployed parents. My school was and still is formally labelled as "disadvantaged" by D/Education.

The difference between my family and others my area was that my parents had a work ethic and by not drinking excessively, smoking, gambling etc. were able to afford a mortgage when others with higher incomes took the easy option of council housing and some the even easier option of not working. When my father was made redundant in the 80s with no prospect of ever working in his area of employment ever again, to use an old Tory expression, "he got up on his bike and went searching for work" and started from the bottom again at entry level in another totally different type of job.

Myself and my 4 siblings all went to college, and all paid our own way through working part time throughout. I know from personal experience that these "barriers" that left wing people talk about are all in the mind - anyone in this country with a bit of work ethic can get themselves out of poverty very easily.
 
Protocol said:
What they do is estimate the disposable income per equivalised person, then they get 60% of it, and set this as the "poverty line". If your disp income is below this, then you are "at-risk-of-poverty".
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Why chose 60%? Either way, as a previous poster has pointed out, this goalpost will be moving until the end of time. There will always be people living below 60% of the CSO's median for whatever reasons. I don't think anyone is arguing this isn't the case. The debate is what we do about it. Some believe equality of opportunity is key. Other's believe we should live in the Republic of Marx.
 

Indeed. This type of honourable work ethic is paramount. Bad parenting has a lot to answer for, in terms of social disadvantage. And I am not talking of mental, age, or phsyical disadvantage here. These people should get 100% support in every way.

But as far as the work-shy, criminal, or addicted to substances go - how should the government intervene here in order to instill the proper work ethic and respect for society, community and oneself? I have many friends from poor backgrounds, and my own isn't wealthy either. I have friends from the poorest parts of town. They aren't whinging about equality. One of them has started up his own business, and one of them has started a community network bringing people (including former drug addicts) together for a common purpose. Sometimes they get patronised by outsiders from wealthy backgrounds too. But they are doing it for themselves.
 
csirl said:
I know from personal experience that these "barriers" that left wing people talk about are all in the mind - anyone in this country with a bit of work ethic can get themselves out of poverty very easily.
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In other words the probelm is primarily social, not economic.
 
Purple said:
In other words the problem is primarily social, not economic.
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Hear, hear.

And back to the civil servants again:


4% increase in their expenses. Or was that a 4% increment? Either way, this isn't going to help us fight our way out of recession.
 
Purple said:
The increases are small and costs are going up. I don't think that this will ruin the country.
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I don't think anyone would begrudge genuine mileage. However, the fact that most claim around the €4000 mark indicates possible abuse of the system.
 
shnaek said:
4% increase in their expenses. Or was that a 4% increment? Either way, this isn't going to help us fight our way out of recession.
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I don't think it is hard to argue that motor costs in general have increased by a lot more than 4% since last July.
 
Someone once told me that one of the motivations in getting these rates increased is the knock on effects on TDs expenses.
 
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