The Singer Solution To World Poverty Summary

472 Words2 Pages
In the article “The Singer Solution to World Poverty”, Peter Singer is trying to convince the people of America to donate a large portion of their income to help prevent world hunger. He recommends they save the money they would have typically spent on extra or luxury goods, as they are not a necessity to life, and give it to a charity that aids in helping to end world starvation such as UNICEF or Oxfam America. Although Singer’s proposition sounds like a good idea in theory, I don’t believe it is a practical way that this issued can be solved. It would be very hard to find someone who is willing to give a large sum of their earned income to aid people so far away. Singer attempts to appeal to your inner moral being by comparing his idea to two different situations. In the first, he tells you a story about a woman who is a struggling retired school teacher trying to make ends meet. A person offers her $1,000.00 to take a homeless, young boy to an…show more content…
The man, Bob, has invested his life savings into an old, rare car. Although the car means a lot to him he has been unable to insure it, therefore he must be very careful with it. Bob not only greatly enjoys driving the car, he plans on selling it once he is retired and plans on living off of the profits for the rest of his life. One day Bob decides to go park down on the railway siding and take a walk. As he is going along, he notices a train coming wildly down the tracks and it is heading straight for a child. He knows he is unable to stop the train, but notices he could flip a switch causing the train to go down the railway siding. To his dismay, if he flips the switch it will take out his car. Bob considers his options and decides he doesn’t want to lose his life savings, so he lets the train kill the child. Bob does not seem to affected by this outcome too much and lives the rest of his life enjoying his car and

More about The Singer Solution To World Poverty Summary

Open Document