Originally posted by CosmoKing:
many of the current 'help to the poor' schemes are stop gap measures or just some shut yr mouth goodwill fees. Say, the 50 bucks subsidy for the poor in response to the transport fare hike..is that a lot of money? Rich folks would have a car or many cars and $50 won't even fill a full tank. it is usually the poor who will be staying at some ulu estates and because of the journey, will burn up their fare cards much faster. wonder how the geniuses conjure these schemes and everything gets the go-ahead...perhaps it is such a paltry sum that won't even entice the poor to take up the offer. the argument is that we would like to prevent a 'crutch mentality' but this is such an over-used phrase for not thinking about longer term solutions and the fact is, effective help is not getting out to those that need them now. training and education can work for some but not all as there are just a myriad of circumstances facing each and every individual who may be in need. the strange thing that could happen is that the younger generations may be the ones more likely to succumb to welfarism than the face-saving older generations. with help being dislocated at present, whether these measures will work in the near future towards/against this noble principle is still hard to tell. for now, it is not uncommon to see the poor having difficulties to even raise $50 to top up their cpf just to get some handout. and this is the ground-zero. and, while we get freebies on/off, without fail those monies will faithfully return to paying back some form of taxes or utilities besides the bread and water on the table. yes, the faceless corporates are creeping up and making more feel unbearable. and with globalization initiatives hailed as strategic visions, have one's life and values improved? are we charging forward blindly or at an over-competitive pace that will just bring more problems? just hope we don't underestimate the building tensions between the rich-poor divide as for a long time, these were major catalysts for revolutions, wars and social problems of all sorts. things are going wrong when you read the papers about kids talking about being in top prestigious schools vis a vis neighbourhood schools, different classes of the very rich and poor, gold taps/peanuts and racial discrimination. if we imagine all these as connective factors held together in a larger framework, any dissatisfaction with the economic-centric model would just break one of the links and unleash destructive manifestations. the evil eye is something real and the enemy from 'within' will be the most difficult to manage.
sorry, are you writing a legal document or what? can you break into paragraphs for easy reading please.