Letting Your Kids Starve

[el_expatriado]

So imagine for a minute you are a parent and you have 7 kids. With the job you are working you can feed, clothe, and educate 5 kids properly. The only way to make the numbers work is letting 2 kids go without food. Those two kids are going to die. But if you only had to feed 5 kids, after a while you'd get a promotion at work since your boss doesn't see you so desperate and stressed out all the time. Over a long period of time you'd be earning enough to be able to properly support 7 kids, but it's going to take a few years, maybe a decade or more.

The other option is to go out right now and beg, borrow, and steal to try and get some extra food so that your 2 kids don't die. You're going to be permanently stressed out and at work they'll never trust you with a promotion because they know you are desperate and you can't be trusted. Now by begging, borrowing, and stealing, the family isn't ever going to be in a good situation. Things are going to be tough and you'll be living from hand to mouth forever, subsisting. But at least the kids won't die. But they will probably grow up without a good education and in poverty and have to repeat your situation.

What do you do?
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If you haven't guessed by now, this is the story of Argentina. The country's economy doesn't generate enough to provide for everyone who lives here. A choice needs to be made. Cristina and the peronists will always go for the second option. Its the short-term fix, but keeps everyone eating. Macri and the right are going to want to fix the structural problem. Long-term it is the better fix, but there are people who are going to be left out in the cold in order to make the numbers work.

What do think?

Saludos!

 

[steveinbsas]

So imagine for a minute you are a parent and you have 7 kids. With the job you are working you can feed, clothe, and educate 5 kids properly. The only way to make the numbers work is letting 2 kids go without food. Those two kids are going to die. But if you only had to feed 5 kids, after a while you'd get a promotion at work since your boss doesn't see you so desperate and stressed out all the time. Over a long period of time you'd be earning enough to be able to properly support 7 kids, but it's going to take a few years, maybe a decade or more.

The other option is to go out right now and beg, borrow, and steal to try and get some extra food so that your 2 kids don't die. You're going to be permanently stressed out and at work they'll never trust you with a promotion because they know you are desperate and you can't be trusted. Now by begging, borrowing, and stealing, the family isn't ever going to be in a good situation. Things are going to be tough and you'll be living from hand to mouth forever, subsisting. But at least the kids won't die. But they will probably grow up without a good education and in poverty and have to repeat your situation.

What do you do?

I'd teach my kids to spot an example of the false dilema fallacy.

http://grammar.about...alsedilterm.htm

http://www.nizkor.or...se-dilemma.html

If you haven't guessed by now, this is the story of Argentina. The country's economy doesn't generate enough to provide for everyone who lives here. A choice needs to be made. Cristina and the peronists will always go for the second option. Its the short-term fix, but keeps everyone eating. Macri and the right are going to want to fix the structural problem. Long-term it is the better fix, but there are people who are going to be left out in the cold in order to make the numbers work.

What do think?

I think I'd also teach my kids not to commit the fallacy of false anaolgy.

http://grammar.about...analogyterm.htm

http://fallaciesfile...se-analogy.html

 

[nikad]

I don't believe in black and white. In your example Expatriado, it is not about killing to of the kids or going crazy beg, borrow, steal. You can split money and food and each will eat a bit less but you don't need to kill and you don't need to steal or beg. It is all about managing your resources wisely and creatively.

 

[semigoodlookin]

The country's economy doesn't generate enough to provide for everyone who lives here. A choice needs to be made. Cristina and the peronists will always go for the second option. Its the short-term fix, but keeps everyone eating. Macri and the right are going to want to fix the structural problem. Long-term it is the better fix, but there are people who are going to be left out in the cold in order to make the numbers work.

What do think?

I think you probably could have written that in the thread about the country being expensive and it would have had more impact. Your analogy makes little sense because it is not a one or the other scenario ... two kids would not have to starve.

Let them all starve and you would have money to go on vacations, eat out every night, and the population would be lower which would help the state spread the wealth.

 

[Noesdeayer]

el expatriado.
If the "better fix" is done right nobody has to be "left out in the cold" ."The country's economy doesn't generate enough" of what? jobs?, food?.hope?
Maybe not quite yet but if everyone pulls together instead of just bitching, moaning and wishfull thinking,it very well could in the not too" long term".
Unfortunately,many people here want things to happen overnight which is,of course, impossible.
Macri just announced another step in the OMG "right" direction by wanting to be an observer in theTrans Pacific Trade Pact. Down the road ,this could bring more investment and later on local employment. Just ask the Chileans,Peruvians and Colombians.

 

[Somewhereinba]

Maybe stop having 7 kids if you can only afford to support less.

 

[Ceviche]

Maybe stop having 7 kids if you can only afford to support less.

But I guess some humans simply follow "the Selfish Gene " theory by Richard Dawkins and have as many kids as possible..hoping at least some of them will survive all faminies, poverty, troubles on the family.

 

[mc kenna]

Taking it at face value, i would suggest, get a second job! or third, i can assure you there's no lack of jobs around here, your kids are your responsability, and not the states', no need to go out begging or stealing, just work!(btw opennings for managers and rulers of the universe are slim)but there are always opennings for chopping wood and digging ditches, unless you think those jobs have no dignity or are not up to someone's desperate standards. and yes they might not go to the best schools but you will send them to the best school you can afford and that's all you can do. i never liked hand outs and if i had kids i'd pass the concept down to them,at this age i can look up and tell anyone who wants to judge me, that what i have , i have earned it and i had no idea how great that would feel when i was younger, now i'm glad i never stray from that path. Back in them days was called ''man up'',i'm sure these days, this term is not acceptable anymore due to politically correctness......

 

[el_expatriado]

Taking it at face value, i would suggest, get a second job! or third, i can assure you there's no lack of jobs around here, your kids are your responsability, and not the states', no need to go out begging or stealing, just work!(btw opennings for managers and rulers of the universe are slim)but there are always opennings for chopping wood and digging ditches, unless you think those jobs have no dignity or are not up to someone's desperate standards. and yes they might not go to the best schools but you will send them to the best school you can afford and that's all you can do. i never liked hand outs and if i had kids i'd pass the concept down to them,at this age i can look up and tell anyone who wants to judge me, that what i have , i have earned it and i had no idea how great that would feel when i was younger, now i'm glad i never stray from that path. Back in them days was called ''man up'',i'm sure these days, this term is not acceptable anymore due to politically correctness......

There are no more jobs. That's the point of the analogy. There's not enough work to go around to support everyone.

Take a look at the graphic above. Argentina's economy just doesn't generate enough. There are too many people with their hand out and not enough people actually working to sustain the system. I know it is a gross simplification of the situation, but not too far away from what has been happening.

During Cristina's government they did whatever was necessary to make the numbers work (cheating on debt payments, inflation, nationalization of the AFJP funds, etc). Macri is now putting an end to that and working to balance things out in the long-term. In the short-term however, people who aren't productive enough to generate enough to support themselves are going to go hungry.

 

[Dada]

A great disappointment for someone who expects the state to take care of the problem, I understand. One government pretended to take care of it the ridiculous way, the next one doesn't even bother to pretend, and now what?

The same as ever. The question is really the way you put it - what to do now? The question is totally valid. The implication that it eventually might excuse more crime or letting two of one's own kids die is just a product of a populism hangover. If you can stick to the question, you might eventually find the answer, at least for yourself. Btw, Expatriado, I don't think you personally will let 2 of your 7 kids die, and neither will you be forced to use a gun to get some bread for them. There've been worse times before.