The Singer Solution To World Poverty

354 Words2 Pages
Poverty, hunger, illness, and lack of shelter, these are things that plague a majority of the people of the world and yet most of us are not even aware of it. According to Peter Singer, a professor of bioethics, he believes that prosperous people should donate all of the money not needed for the basic requirements of life to organizations meant to help those less fortunate. Though a good idea in theory, there are two sides to it, both positive and negative. By donating all of the money we don’t need to survive we will in turn be helping others survive, thus preserving our way of life and bettering someone else’s. By only donating money that we spend on things not necessary to survive we are still able to live a life that is comfortable and the idea of rich and poor people can be thrown away. Though this could probably only be achieved with government intervention, the possibilities are endless. Of course a big downside to this idea is the fact that we work hard for our money. It can seem like a waste to give it away after we work long and hard to obtain it. Another con is that after living with an excess of everything for so long, the people who are most prosperous might not be as willing to give it up. Their idea of necessary and a middle class family’s idea of necessary can be completely different, so where do we draw the line for how much money each family should have and how much each family should give away? I find Singer’s idea to be a good one, but perhaps a little unrealistic. I believe that a portion of the money that we do not spend on day to day necessities should be given to those in need of it. The reason I think that is because of the simple fact that the American people have been living with an excess of money for so long, to think that overnight we can become accustomed to a lower standard of living is
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