The few own the many because they possess the means of livelihood of all ... The country is governed for the richest, for the corporations, the bankers, the land speculators, and for the exploiters of labor. The majority of mankind are working people. So long as their fair demands – the ownership and control of their livelihoods – are set at naught, we can have neither men’s rights nor women’s rights. The majority of mankind is ground down by industrial oppression in order that the small remnant may live in ease. Helen Keller
Do not waste your time on Social Questions. What is the matter with the poor is Poverty; what is the matter with the rich is Uselessness. George Bernard Shaw
The greatest of our evils and the worst of our crimes is poverty ... our first duty, to which every other consideration should be sacrificed, is not to be poor. George Bernard Shaw, Major Barbara
There’s class warfare, all right, but it’s my class, the rich class, that’s making war, and we’re winning. Warren Buffett
I’ve been rich and I’ve been poor. Believe me, rich is better. Mae West
We were told 4 years ago that 17 million people went to bed hungry every night. Well, that was probably true. They were all on a diet. Ronald Reagan, TV speech 27th October 1964
The United States has some of the best programs and laws in the world to protect its children but, as Unicef has pointed out the US also has one of the highest rates of the industrialized countries for poverty and hunger among children and also for child mortality. A recent story in the Washington Post noted that ‘despite this time of record prosperity, one in every six American children is poor; one in three children of colour. No other developed country has anything approaching US child poverty rates’. Mary Robinson, United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights 2001
Contrary to a myth long popular in the West, it’s been the poor of the world who have financed the rich and not the other way around. John Pilger, War By Other Means, 1992
In rich countries like Britain globalisation is well advanced. The disastrous selling off of the railways and the creeping privatisation of everything, from healthcare to air traffic control – the financial pages proclaim a booming economy, yet one in five British children grows up in poverty. There are almost ten million Britain living in poverty ... All over the world, millions of ordinary people are asking why they have no say in decisions that bring hardship to their lives ... Why should we accept a system of winners and losers? John Pilger, The New Rulers of the World
The rich had always blamed the poor for bringing poverty upon themselves by being idle or feckless. But Rowntree’s study demonstrated in cold statistical facts that people slipped into poverty for many different reasons. The poor were victims; they weren’t genetic failures ... Rowntree’s book published in 1901 and called simply Poverty is among the most important things written by a British person in the twentieth century. Andrew Marr’s Making of Modern Britain, BBC 2009
Why did good hard-working people suffer so? Why were men who were willing, able, and anxious to work, denied jobs? Why was there so much unemployment? Why were there rich people who apparently did little but enjoyed life? I hated poverty. I was determined to do something about the bad conditions under which our family and all around us suffered. I have stuck to that purpose for 46 years. I consider in so doing I have been a good American. I have spent my life among the American workers all over this country, slept in their homes, eaten at their tables. They are the majority of the people who have the inalienable right in our view to govern the country. Elizabeth Gurley Flynn, 1952
Many of us regard ourselves as mildly liberal or centrist politically, voice fairly pleasant sentiments about our poor children, contribute money to send poor kids to summer camp, feel benevolent. We’re not Nazis; we’re nice people. We read sophisticated books. We go to church. We go to synagogue. Meanwhile, we put other people’s children into an economic and environmental death zone. We make it hard for them to get out. We strip the place bare of amenities. And we sit back and say to ourselves, ‘Well, I hope that they don’t kill each other off. But if they do, it’s not my fault.’ Jonathan Kozol
There are only two families in the world, as a grandmother of mine used to say: the haves and have-nots. Miguel de Cervantes, Don Quixote
In the United States child poverty has reached record levels with over sixteen million children now affected. One in twelve Americans are now jobless. Foodbanks and homeless shelters are facing unprecedented demand. America’s Poor Kids, BBC 2013
The homelessness Kaylie fears is already a reality for one and a half million children across the US. ibid.
More than forty-nine million Americans are now living below the poverty line many as a result of unemployment. ibid.
Wealthy men can’t live in an island that is encircled by poverty. We all breathe the same air. We must give a chance to everyone, at least a basic chance. Ayrton Senna
The rich, by unfair combinations, contribute frequently to prolong a season of distress among the poor. Thomas Malthus
I do not see how it is possible for a man to die worth fifty million of dollars, or ten million of dollars, in a city full of want, when he meets almost every day the withered hand of beggary and the white lips of famine. How a man can withstand all that, and hold in the clutch of his greed twenty or thirty million of dollars, is past my comprehension. I do not see how he can do it. I should not think he could do it any more than he could keep a pile of lumber on the beach, where hundreds and thousands of men were drowning in the sea. Robert G Ingersoll, The Liberty of Man, Woman and Child
Money destined for the poor should go to the poor. The Borgias: Paolo s2e2, Rodrigo to Cardinal, Showtime 2012
The London poor with their hideous voices and clothes and bad teeth make one doubt whether any decent life will ever be possible, or whether it matters we are at war or peace. Virginia Woolf
Men feel that cruelty to the poor is a kind of cruelty to animals. They never feel that it is an injustice to equals. Nay, it is an injustice to comrades. G K Chesterton
If there be among you a poor man of one of thy brethren within any of thy gates in thy land which the Lord thy God giveth thee, thou shalt not harden thine heart, nor shut thine hand from thy poor brother:
But thou shalt open thine hand wide unto him, and shalt surely lend him sufficient for his need, in that which he wanteth.
Beware that there be not a thought in thy wicked heart, saying, The seventh year, the year of release, is at hand; and thine eye be evil against thy poor brother, and thou givest him nought; and he cry unto the Lord against thee, and it be sin unto thee.
Thou shalt surely give him, and thine heart shall not be grieved when thou givest unto him: because that for this thing the Lord thy God shall bless thee in all thy works, and in all that thou puttest thine hand unto. Deuteronomy 15:7-10
He preserveth not the life of the wicked: but giveth right to the poor. Job 36:6
He delivereth the poor in his affliction, and openeth their ears in oppression. Job 36:15
Blessed is he that considereth the poor: the Lord will deliver him in time of trouble. Psalms 41:1
The destruction of the poor is their poverty. Proverbs 10:15
Better is the poor that walketh in his integrity, than he that is perverse in his lips, and is a fool.
Wealth maketh many friends; but the poor is separated from his neighbour.
He that hath pity upon the poor lendeth unto the Lord; and that which he hath given will he pay him again. Proverbs 19:1&4&17
The rich and poor meet together: the Lord is the maker of them all.
The rich ruleth over the poor, and the borrower is servant to the lender.
He that oppresseth the poor to increase his riches, and he that giveth to the rich, shall surely come to want.
Rob not the poor, because he is poor: neither oppress the afflicted in the gate. Proverbs 22:2&7&16&22
Better is the poor that walketh in his uprightness, than he that is perverse in his ways, though he be rich.
The rich man is wise in his own conceit; but the poor that hath understanding searcheth him out.
As a roaring lion, and a ranging bear; so is a wicked ruler over the poor people.
He that hasteth to be rich hath an evil eye, and considereth not that poverty shall come upon him.
He that giveth unto the poor shall not lack: but he that hideth his eyes shall have many a curse. Proverbs 28:6&11&15&22&27
The righteous considereth the cause of the poor: but the wicked regardeth not to know it. Proverbs 29:7