POVERTY AND CRIMES

Poverty
The word poverty is derived from French word “Pauvre”, meaning poor. Material possession of having little or no more means to support oneself is called poverty according to Bargata and Borgata . Poverty is of two types absolute poverty which refers to the basic needs of human life which commonly includes food, water, sanitation, shelter, clothing, health care and education and relative poverty which is defined as economic inequality in the location or society in which people live.
According to World Bank “A person earning less than 1.25 US dollar a day is called a poor.” Poverty is a major social problem because many other social problems in the form of crimes are originated from it. There are two categories of poverty one is national poverty line which is according to the individual country and the second is international poverty line which is internationally considered. In Pakistan 22.3% of the total population is living below national poverty line and 21.04 % are poor according to international poverty line according to a World Bank survey in 2006. A large number of people have to sleep under bridges and to beg in streets. Poverty is a multidimensional phenomenon reflecting itself in every walk of life. It has come to permanently stay in the country and is visible in almost all facet of our urban as well as rural environments. There are two kinds of poor deserving poor who owe their misfortune to circumstances beyond their control such as illness or the death of spouse and undeserving poor whose situation is considered to be the result of some personal failing or inadequacy. Further most sociological explanations of poverty fall into two categories: those who believe that poverty is the result of attitudes, values and behavior-known as cultural explanations and those who believe it is caused by economic, social or political factors within the structure of society –known as structural explanations.
Charles Booth the social researcher and reformer established a subsistence level poverty line based on his research in London’s poor. Using this line, he declared that about one third of London’s population is living in poverty. He claimed that poverty was caused largely by circumstances beyond the control of poor people, in particular, low and irregular wages.
It is hard to separate causes and effects of poverty but poverty is associated with economic and social ills. Population explosion, illiteracy or ignorance, unemployment, less incomes, high taxation, lack of industrialization, income inequalities, inflation, lack of charities, early marriages, increase in divorce rate, physical and mental disabilities, over dependence on agriculture, greed, famines, war and lack of govt. policies for the welfare of people are considered to be the some causes of poverty. The following graph shows the proportion of world population in extreme poverty 1981-2008 according to World Bank. 1995 is the year observed as poverty eradication year by SAARC. The international day for the eradication of poverty is celebrated every year on October 17 throughout the world. The Chronic Poverty Research Center (CPRC) is an international partnership of universities, research institutes and NGOs established in 2000 with initial funding from the UK’s Department for International Development. Poverty and Crimes
Poverty is a social problem of Pakistan because people have limited economic and earning resources which are not even enough to meet the basic needs and other facilities like health, education, transportation, clothes, good food and a reasonable place to live in. These people are mostly frustrated when their needs of life are not fulfilled. This frustration leads to commit crimes. Poverty is not acceptable to anyone except the truly religious “dervishes” or “sufis” or mystics. Normal people also demand a certain standard of living. George Bernard Shaw had opined that “very few people can afford to be poor”, he was quite right. Poverty has an intimate connection with crimes. Although it is true that all criminals are not poor and all the poor are not criminals, it is the likelihood of the people living in poverty to commit crimes that brings up the correlation. The causes and effects of poverty are the determining factors that usually give rise to the crimes. The truth is that all of us share equal probability of doing evil. What is it that keeps us away from doing evil? Is it our inherent goodness? Is it lack of reason? Perhaps, if we were not enjoying the best of life, and we were desperately needful, we would be driven to committing crimes. It is true that people on the streets having no roof over their heads having a bunch of hungry children and loved ones cannot survive too long on a diet of morals or ethics and it is that hunger that drives poverty to seek solace in crimes. Poverty is not innate it is mostly situational. The gap between the richest and the poorest also contributes to this as well. Poverty an economic problem is seen as a factor People are desperate for the necessities of life, they are desperate for an escape from their dismal situation. This intense desperation is the cause of crimes in all its forms. “Crimes offer a way in which impoverished people can obtain material goods that they cannot attain through legitimate means.” (Taylor)