Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: Long term sustainability

[byron patterson (byronpatterson]

On 7/11/07, Byron Patterson byronpatterson [at] gmail.com

Hi, Cohousers

I am a member of the CohoDC cohousing group. Our group reached difficulty
in our path of developing CohoDC. We have been meeting since March 2007
and some members move on to other forms of housing. A major challenge
of the CohoDC was diversity in levels of wealth. The group wanted to embrace
the multi-culture of Washington, D.C., but could not agree on the best path
of development. It is hard to help someone, when you associate that someone
with something negative. It is hard for me to read or hear; of people living
in
poverty described as poor. There are many circumstances, which can lead to
poverty for individuals and communities. The over exploitation of resources;

isolation or segregation of groups are a few examples. A way to overcome
poverty in communities is through the development of civil infrastructure.
Developing the way individuals and groups engage in business and society.
A knowledge of the discplines and processes; which individuals or
groups use
in your community to interact.














On 7/9/07, Oliveau [at] aol.com <Oliveau [at] aol.com> wrote:
> Hey Racheli,
>    Thanks for your comments.  I looked it up and  I stand corrected.  You
> are right.  The number of people living in  poverty as hovered around 1.2
> billion.  In 1987 it was 1.18 billion, in  1990's it was 1.3 billion, and
> it has
> recently declined to 1.2 billion.  So  in absolute numbers poverty has not
> declined recently.
>    But as a percentage we have made great  progress.  In the 1950's half
> of
> the global population lived in  poverty.  Today it's down to a
> quarter.  All
> this in the midst of a  continued population growth.  We've moved 3.4billion
> people out of  poverty.  That's an amazing result.
>    I'm not saying we shouldn't continue to try and  help the poor.  We
> should.  We should be investing in education for  the poor, which will
> benefit our
> global society tremendously.  We should be  thinking of new ways to help
> the
> poor, like mico-lending.  The World Bank  and IMF are trying to help these
> countries.  They may have mistaken ideas  which are outdated.  And they
> controlled
> by nations which have political  bais.  It's easy to criticize, but much
> tough to come up with an  alternative which works.  Aiding the developing
> world is
> a hard  problem.
>    And the countries which liberalized and invited in  those evil
> multi-nationals back in the 1970's, like Taiwan, Korea,
> Singapore,  Thailand, Malaysia
> have much happier healthier and well educated people  today.  The ones
> which
> talked about autonomy and the evils of global  capitalism have not.  As
> China
> and India have "liberalized" their  economies, they have tapped into a
> huge
> reserve of productive human capital  which as transformed them from
> starvation
> prone areas to economic  miracles.
>    Cancer death rates go up as people  age.  Up to age 25, cancer deaths
> are
> 4 in 100,000.  Every 10 years  after that the death rate triples until
> it's
> 400/100,000 at age 50.  By age  70 its 1,350/100,000.  If you adjust for
> age,
> the death rate is flat in the  US, with a recent downward trend as people
> have
> quit smoking.  If you  eliminate cancers attributable to smoking, the
> death
> rate has been declining in  the US since 1950.
>    We've gotten better at detecting cancers and  detecting them early
> (when
> they can better be treated).  This results in a  slight increase of
> incidence
> of cancer, but a decrease in the death rate from  cancer.
>    I agree with you that income inequality has been  increasing.  It's not
> that the poor are getting poorer, rather, the  difference between the
> richest
> and the poorest person is getting larger.  I  don't like inequality, but
> if
> that helps the most people the fastest, I'm  willing to live with a tamed
> form of
> Global Capitalism.  But capitalism  needs to be watched, regulated, and
> controlled.  Otherwise we end up  living in a Charles Dickens novel :-)
>    I do worry about the US and the decrease in  mobility between the rich
> and the poor.  It's getting harder to move up in  US society.  That tells
> me
> that we aren't creating enough opportunity for  the poor and we're making
> it too
> easy for untalented rich to stay rich.   Just look at our current
> President
> for a primary example :-)
>    I accept your points about Israel.  I  don't have your experience with
> Israeli society.  I can  imagine Israel has paid a terrible price for the
> high
> level of militarization  and the frequency of its wars with it's
> neighbors.
> The tragedy of the  Middle East is that people who are insecure don't care
> about
> democracy, or human  rights, or equality, or even economic
> opportunity.  And
> it's easy for a  small minority to create an unsafe climate for everyone
> else.
>
> Thanks for your attention,
> -Kevin
>
> In a message dated 7/8/2007 9:38:27 A.M. Pacific Daylight Time,
> racheli [at] sonoracohousing.com writes:
>
> Hi  Kevin,
> You wrote (in part) :
>
> Second, the  condition of humanity has been getting  steadily better
> over
> the  last century, by almost any measure you care to look  at.   Wealth,
> education, calorie consumption, and life expectancy for the   whole
> planet have all
> been going up, both as a percentage and in  absolute  numbers.  The
> number of
> people living in poverty,  or without healthcare, or  without enough
> food has been
> going  down, both as a percentage and in absolute  numbers.  Cancer
> deaths
> (after adjusting for longer life) are going   down.
>
> As I understand it, this is false in a number of ways.
>
> Let  me address a few points:
> Some people are getting much wealthier, while many  get poorer and
> poorer.  So, yes,
> for a tiny fraction of the  population things are getting "better".
> There are about 1 billion people  (this isn't the exact number) who are
> chronically  hungry/
> malnourished.  More than at any other time in history in  absolute
> numbers.  My impression
> is that the number of people  living in poverty is growing, not
> diminishing - including in
> the US, as  jobs are shipped elsewhere (and the people who do those jobs
> overseas or  across
> the border aren't paid a living wage, to put it mildly).
> Many  many countries, under the pressure to "liberalize" exerted upon
> them by  the IMF and the  World
> Bank (read: by the US) have gone back on  providing affordable health
> care, on subsidizing essential
> food items  etc.
> I'll give you as an example a country which on the surface is a great
> recipient of US largesse: Israel.
> When I was growing up there, everyone  had health insurance for
> pittance, there was a serious safety
> net in  place to keep people from going hungry, and the gap between the
> poorest  and the richest was
> not so big.  It was hardly a wonderful place -  discrimination against
> Palestinian citizens, against
> Mizrahi Jews (Jews  who came from the Middle East and North Africa),
> etc. was serious, but on  the
> whole the culture and social mores strongly supported an economic
> safety net.
> With liberalization, things have gone downhill.  There  are people who
> don't have enough to eat,
> about fifth of the children  live in poverty, many elderly are in dire
> straights, and so on.
> And  this is a country which gets about 3 billion dollars a year from
> the US  govt. (mostly
> earmarked for military purposes), not to mention the help US  Jews and
> others provide in addition!
> Things are much worse in other  places.
>
> I disagree with your assessment of healthcare and health.   My
> impression is that there is much
> more cancer - including among  children, and younger people because of
> growing pollution.
> This is  before we come to the AIDS epidemic; chronic ailments which are
> rampant,  etc.
>
> Education?  I suppose you mean "formal education", Western  style.  I
> have serious questions
> regarding how educational it  really is, and concerns regarding
> traditional appropriate  knowledge
> which is disappearing in many places, as subsistence living gets
> destroyed to make room for
> corporate agriculture and industry.   (Again - Vandana Shiva's writings
> are especially useful
> in this  respect).
>
> All of those are, of course, huge subjects which I barely  touched on.
>
> Best,
> Racheli
>
>
>
>
>
>
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