{UAH} Escaping poverty is like prison break
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12:47 PM |
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By Maverick Blutaski
Escaping poverty is like prison break. You have to plan against all obstacles and derive the associated mitigations to ensure that even when you escape it, you work hard not to go back down in the dungeon.
You don't just walk or pray your way out of prison and so is poverty. Even if you successffuly escaped from prison, there is no guarantee your jailor won't be hunting for you either to put you out of action or take you back to jail this time in solitary confinement. And poverty is just like that.
Poverty requires meticulous discipline and planning to overcome even for countries with vast resources.
Poverty like debt can be cyclical through generations unless someone wins a lottery or works extra hard to break the cycle. Poverty like debt is inherently passed over from generation to another. If ones grandparents were poor, chances are the parents were poor too and reasons one is in their current station.
One has to work the problem backward. What are the factors that led to generations trapped in poverty then interrogate those risk factors. The factors could be social, political or both. But those risk factors have to be fully understood and factored into any new strategic plan.
COVID-19 no doubt has impacted many people globally and there is a likelihood many who had attained a certain level of decent livelihood are going to slide back down the pyramid. The pandemic is a factor now. There are generations of families despite occupying 100 acres of land have not produced their first University graduate just yet. There are also educated people who have failed to find employment after their families selling off their land with the hope their investment will have a good return. Those who were lucky to find a job are under deployed, poorly paid and overly taxed back to their villages where they came from. The cost of education vs the planned & actual return on investment is starting to generate cartoons in people's heads even in developed economies.
In short, there are no quick answers. You however have to find something to sell to the market; a product or a service(skill). Whatever it is that you want to sell, do it well and make it work through consistent planning, execution and discipline for continuous improvement. Before all these, understand yourself better by beaming into your history for lessons so that you derive a desired target strategic state to work for.
Invest in attaining a special skill to provide a service on demand or develop a unique product that addresses market problems. There is a difference between persuing knowledge and skills. It costs much more to acquire knowledge through traditional channels than on-demand skills in time and space such as Auto mechanics, fabrication or plumbing from a technical institution or through self training which could pay the same hourly rates. The cost vs the benefit of whether to load yourself with more knowledge than skills to apply what you already know against all competing factors is a personal choice you may have very few people to provide direction. You could get both knowledge and skills at the same time although this path is now debatable.
If you want real examples, I will expand this post further but for now;
The choice is about efficient allocation of meagre resources(money, time) to optimize utility.
Mzee Kabulasoke.
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-- Escaping poverty is like prison break. You have to plan against all obstacles and derive the associated mitigations to ensure that even when you escape it, you work hard not to go back down in the dungeon.
You don't just walk or pray your way out of prison and so is poverty. Even if you successffuly escaped from prison, there is no guarantee your jailor won't be hunting for you either to put you out of action or take you back to jail this time in solitary confinement. And poverty is just like that.
Poverty requires meticulous discipline and planning to overcome even for countries with vast resources.
Poverty like debt can be cyclical through generations unless someone wins a lottery or works extra hard to break the cycle. Poverty like debt is inherently passed over from generation to another. If ones grandparents were poor, chances are the parents were poor too and reasons one is in their current station.
One has to work the problem backward. What are the factors that led to generations trapped in poverty then interrogate those risk factors. The factors could be social, political or both. But those risk factors have to be fully understood and factored into any new strategic plan.
COVID-19 no doubt has impacted many people globally and there is a likelihood many who had attained a certain level of decent livelihood are going to slide back down the pyramid. The pandemic is a factor now. There are generations of families despite occupying 100 acres of land have not produced their first University graduate just yet. There are also educated people who have failed to find employment after their families selling off their land with the hope their investment will have a good return. Those who were lucky to find a job are under deployed, poorly paid and overly taxed back to their villages where they came from. The cost of education vs the planned & actual return on investment is starting to generate cartoons in people's heads even in developed economies.
In short, there are no quick answers. You however have to find something to sell to the market; a product or a service(skill). Whatever it is that you want to sell, do it well and make it work through consistent planning, execution and discipline for continuous improvement. Before all these, understand yourself better by beaming into your history for lessons so that you derive a desired target strategic state to work for.
Invest in attaining a special skill to provide a service on demand or develop a unique product that addresses market problems. There is a difference between persuing knowledge and skills. It costs much more to acquire knowledge through traditional channels than on-demand skills in time and space such as Auto mechanics, fabrication or plumbing from a technical institution or through self training which could pay the same hourly rates. The cost vs the benefit of whether to load yourself with more knowledge than skills to apply what you already know against all competing factors is a personal choice you may have very few people to provide direction. You could get both knowledge and skills at the same time although this path is now debatable.
If you want real examples, I will expand this post further but for now;
The choice is about efficient allocation of meagre resources(money, time) to optimize utility.
Mzee Kabulasoke.
"When a man is stung by a bee, he doesn't set off to destroy all beehives"
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