Responsibility to the Poor

I have been having a great conversation this week with my pastor on how best to create a society that best alleviates poverty.

This video I found to be a beautiful thing, coupled with the video in the top right, I find it to be inspirational...



"Approximately 75% of all monies allocated to fight poverty ends up feeding the huge bureaucracy set up to fight poverty. It isn't that the U.S. government hasn't spent enough money; it's that the money has been spent counter productively. Ronald Nash and Thomas Sowell insist that we could raise every poor person in the U.S. out of poverty in one week and reduce the budget for the programs by 75 percent simply by eliminating the huge bureaucracy that stands between the poor and the federal treasury."

So, how do we lessen the bureaucratic overhead and deliver more bang for the buck to help alleviate poverty in this society? I would argue, more reliance on tax credits and vouchers. It works wonderfully in school voucher programs in the areas where it is tried, but is not more broadly applied due to special interests, pressure from teachers unions. Similar programs could be used to encourage more generosity in society in other areas.