Chapter 6 Question 4

In chapter 6 of Naked Economics Wheelan comes up with a few solutions to poverty. First off he talks about how poverty is a symptom of an illness. The illness is the lack of human capital. People living in poverty in this world most likely don't have human capital. They haven't been educated, haven't been taught much, and most likely haven't been taught skills that would make them valuable in this world. Wheelan uses the analogy of human capital as if someone was stripped away from everything and what is left with them is their skills, virtues, and assets that make them valuable in this world, that is their human capital. So the solution is human capital. Investing human capital in this world will decrease poverty. I think of poverty as in some cases a constant cycle. The parents didnt get education and lack human capital and therefore can't find a job or work making them poor. Now their kids are living in poverty and won't most likely get education due to their parents. Now those kids have kids and the cycle continues. So the solution isn't to just give them money or give hand outs, the solution is human capital. Educate them, train them, open them up to skills they are gifted with but can't know because of the state their in. Now say the kid gets educated and trained with skills, the kid has kids and educates them and the cycle is destroyed thanks to human capital. Praise God for human capital and the gifts he has given us!