Reflection-Week 11

I fondly refer to the past week as “The Week from Hell”. While it may have been business as usual for my floor mates, my professors decided that it would be the perfect week to spring an exam, an oral presentation, and a paper all in the same day. Thus, with my already hectic schedule I had to find time to include review sessions for my exam, office hour visits for my exam, and preparation for my oral presentation. It was nice to be able to have the luxury to take a week off from a blog post, it freed up some time for me.
Our discussion of wealth on Thursday was quite interesting to me. It is no secret that the majority of our world lives in conditions considered at or below the poverty line. In fact, the World Bank recently increased the poverty wage to $1.25 a day, increasing the number considered living in poverty to 1.4 billion people around the world with the majority of these people living in Southeast Asia. In response to the accusations that the United States isn’t doing enough to respond, I moderately agree. Problems like poverty do, and continue to exist all around the world. Instead of focusing on how to help these people in the short-term, I think the focus should be on the long-term. Simply sending money and aid will only make these countries more and more dependent on the wealth that our country has worked so hard to achieve. I do feel the United States should do more to actively engage and help out the poverty stricken around the world, but it simply cannot happen by simply donating money and food to those who experience poverty. Never has the proverb “Give a man a fish and he eats for a day, teach a man to fish and he eats for a lifetime” been truer. We, as a wealthy nation, need to be the teachers, not the givers.
At the outset, it must be acknowledged that the argument between wealth and poverty should not be the existence of them, but the gap between them. The wealthy and the poor is a hierarchy in our society that cannot be deconstructed. It human instinct to divide itself into categories, and it will only continue in the future. A gap will always exist, narrowing the gap can aid in this, but there will always be something there that keeps a separation between the two. Political persuasions aside, I think that the invisible hand as described by Adam Smith is and will continue to be the driving force in our economic system. To me it means that the wealth of a nation will continue to rely upon the free will of people, and it is up to the people to actively pursue their own self-interests to benefit themselves. While this may seem to continue the world order in which we live, we must spend time and money currently on overcoming other major issues. Right now, the world has so much on its plate, we need to focus on some key issues and get those done first.
On a lighter note, the Pentagon was a very interesting and cool thing to do. It was a very standard overview of the headquarters of the Department of Defense. The coolest part was probably the Honor Guard tour guide who walked backwards the entire time, while delivering a speech, and did not look backwards the entire time. Having that opportunity really makes living in this city worth it. It was the highlight of my “Week from Hell”