Wealth. Poverty. America

by Brian Haferkamp

I’m reading a book called, The Irresistible Revolution, by Shane Claiborne, and he writes the following line:

I truly believe that when the poor meet the rich, riches will have no meaning. And when the rich meet the poor, we will see poverty come to an end.

There has been much made in the past couple of decades of the widening wealth gap in the world. What I’m thinking is that if the rich were to decide to abolish poverty, it would also abolish wealth. Money is a resource, and a finite one at that. We can print more money but that makes it worthless, so we don’t just print it when we need it (ahem, well, we shouldn’t). So if the rich were to give their money to the poor, this is redistribution of that finite resource and would leave the wealthy less wealthy and the poor more wealthy.

I know that it’s popular to portray wealth as a negative (especially among those who aren’t wealthy), but is a large wealth gap a negative? Are we stuck with the poor for all of existence? Will there always be the destitute and those who are so wealthy they can wipe themselves with $100 bills? Is this the natural order of things, or is some level in the middle of the income spectrum possible?

These are questions for which I have no answer.