Ways in which poverty can negatively impacts people

The negative impacts of poverty can be felt across all levels of the society. Dick Gregory, a civil rights activist who was born and raised in poverty later on in life became an icon in the war against poverty. He described his situation as chocking with poverty and called on authorities to stop being hypocritical and act on poverty. Reyna Grande also wrote extensively on the impacts of poverty to the society. She describes her situation as a Mexican immigrant who was separated from her parent at a young age. She was consequently raised by her grandparents in a poor corner of Mexico. However, as she came to learn later, her father, who had migrated to the United States to look for greener pastures did not escape home poverty after all. Generally, the negative effects of poverty from personal experiences and observations by Dick Gregory and Reyna Grande include malnutrition, poor health, little or no access to education, deteriorated economy and disruptions of societal norms.

Malnutrition is mainly manifested in children from poor families. Poverty denies people access to foods that are high in nutrition. For those who can access them, it is a challenge to find money to purchase these kinds of food. This is because most of the healthiest foods are increasingly becoming more expensive. Therefore, families operating on small budgets will less likely to purchase nutritious foods just because they cannot afford. Other times some people are just malnourished because they do not enough food to eat. This mostly common in developing countries where 25 percent face hunger due to poverty (Global Issues 1). Besides, malnutrition can cause severe health issues. Grande recollects memories of how she, together with her siblings suffered hunger and sorrow while growing up under the care of their maternal grandparents. Gregory could not have described this situation better. He says, “I was pregnant with poverty. Pregnant with dirt and pregnant with smells that made people turn away, pregnant with cold and pregnant with shoes that were never bought for me, pregnant with five other people in my bed and no Daddy in the next room, and pregnant with hunger” (Gregory and Lipsyte 167).

Health effects have increasingly become one of the most severe impacts of poverty across the world. This is normally centered on life expectancy, diseases and medicine. People living in poverty do not have access to resources that would help them maintain healthy living conditions. They are therefore prone to diseases. The absence of nutritious foods in the body decreases the ability of the body to fight diseases off. Additionally, poor sanitation conditions always increase poor people’s probability of contracting diseases. Further still, when diseases strike, poor people cannot afford the right and recommended medicines for treatment of their ailments. Poverty also affects child mortality and life expectancy. Available statistics indicate that life expectancy in poor nations is 30 percent less than that of wealthy nations. Besides, 13.5 percent of children under the age of 5 years old die annually in poor countries (Global Issues 1).

Poverty also inhibits children from attending school from early age. In most cases, poor families cannot afford school supplies and the necessary clothing for their children. This includes transport means to school. Without the right education, many people who are living in poverty remain illiterate through life. Incidentally, low literacy rates have direct correlations to the development of the society. This is in view of the fact that persons from poor backgrounds are excluded from politics and employment in their countries. Evidence suggests that 171 million people could be pulled out of poverty with basic education (Global Issues 1). Gregory (164) argues that poverty and education intertwine. This is because poverty prohibits its victims from obtaining appropriate education and lack of appropriate education inhibits people from escaping poverty (Grande 164).

Poverty has a direct impact on the economy of a country. When poverty rates are so high, the number of people to be employed is seriously affected. Poor people without education are least likely to get well paying jobs. A high unemployment rate is dangerous for a country for it prevents it from gaining a strong economic system. It actually impedes all aspects of development for a country. When a large part of a country’s population is unemployed, it means that there is very little contribution to the economic development of the country. The strategic ways to improve economy must be thought out cleverly. Some efforts can actually lead to more impoverishments of populations. For instance, in “The Distance between Us”, Grande illustrates how father’s quest to pull his family out of poverty sank them deeper into poverty instead (Grande 273). However, in a rare show of events, her father is very optimistic that if their work hard, they will escape poverty. He opines, 'Hills and bushes, that's all it is. But we must walk across it' (Grande 150).

Poverty can also affect the society in a negative way. Many poor people are driven to the streets due to their homelessness status. Poverty and crime are also related. Unemployment and homelessness may lead to social unrest and therefore causing increase in crime. Without money to purchase necessities, some poor people could be forced to resort to theft or robbery as a means of survival. Grande vividly captivates her poverty conditions while living with her poverty stricken and cruel grandparents in Mexico. These have negative impacts on the overall image of the country. It is evidence from the discussions above that poverty has immense negative impacts on the people (Grande 79). It distorts the societal structures. Grande underscores that, “We were already living in some kind of Hell in this strange place of broken beauty” (Grande 97). 

  

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Works cited

Global Issues. "Poverty Facts and Stats." 2013. Global Issues. Web. 2015 Nov 15.

Grande, Reyna. The Distance Between Us: A Memoir. New York: Simon and Schuster, 2013.

            Print.

Gregory, Dick and Robert Lipsyte. Nigger. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1990. Print.