In the USA, not buying a few packs of cigarettes can save you enough money to buy a whole month's worth of rice and beans. I've seen quite a few "poor people" at the supermarket using government funded EBT cards to pay $3 for a 10 ounce bag of potato chips (in addition to buying a whole bunch of other expensive, unhealthy crap).
Now if you're talking outside the USA, then yes, there are plenty of "truly poor". And our government doesn't help. E.g. we mandate using huge percentages of our corn crop to make Ethanol as a gasoline additive. That drives up the cost of basic staples like corn in Mexico.
There are many truly poor people around the world. There are very few of them in the USA, unless it's because of mental health issues or because of voluntary lifestyle choices.
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In the USA, not buying a few packs of cigarettes can save you enough money to buy a whole month's worth of rice and beans. I've seen quite a few "poor people" at the supermarket using government funded EBT cards to pay $3 for a 10 ounce bag of potato chips (in addition to buying a whole bunch of other expensive, unhealthy crap).
Now if you're talking outside the USA, then yes, there are plenty of "truly poor". And our government doesn't help. E.g. we mandate using huge percentages of our corn crop to make Ethanol as a gasoline additive. That drives up the cost of basic staples like corn in Mexico.
There are many truly poor people around the world. There are very few of them in the USA, unless it's because of mental health issues or because of voluntary lifestyle choices.