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Samantha Riedl
June 16, 2016
PEACE 489
Poverty
Part I
Poverty is a worldwide, global problem involving more than just third world countries.

Every country in the world experiences poverty, but its what the governments of those countries

do to solve the problem that makes all the difference. Costa Rica and the United States are very

different in many ways, but they also share some similarities. Although poverty cannot always

be seen, its always around.

Costa Rica

Costa Rica is very familiar to extreme poverty. In 1982, poverty hit 48% of the

population. Luckily, activists and policy changes decreased the percentage to 16% in 1994.

Over a seven year span, Costa Rica only managed to decrease the poverty rate to 15% in 2011

(Bradley, 2013, pp. 2). As of 2014, Costa Rica has achieved moderate economic growth and has

one of the lowest homicide rates in Latin America over the past twenty years, but the poverty rate

has remained the same at 20%. Between 2013 and 2014, the amount of households living in

poverty increased by 1.7% and had a 6.7% increase of households living in extreme poverty

(Mitchell, 2014, pp. 1). Just like in many other countries, tourists are very surprised by the

amount of poverty in Costa Rica. In the United States many people picture beautiful sandy

beaches, rainforests, and various tourist attractions as depicted on many travel websites. A very

common tourist destination is the Province of Guanacaste. In Guanacaste there are many sandy

beaches and tropical getaways, but the people who live there have a much different experience
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when compared to tourists. Almost 22% of residents live in extreme poverty which isnt

anywhere near living in a tropical paradise (Bradley, 2013, pp. 1-2).

There are many causes for poverty within a country, but for Costa Rica the main causes

are income distribution, education, and household diversity. Family structures are very important

when determining causes for high poverty. Single motherhood is very highly correlated with

female poverty in many countries, but very much so in Costa Rica. Statistics show that single

mother in Costa Rica in 2008/2009 were 8.5% more likely to be poor than women who live in

households with other individuals (Kasy & Ramos-Chaves, 2011, p. 1). Although these statistics

may be skewed because there are a greater amount of women who are the head of the household

in Costa Rica, so it may account for greater numbers of women in poverty (Chant, 2009, p. 20).

Having more adults in the household obviously means having more people earning money, but

having children or other dependents also means that there are more people to share income with.

This makes it harder for single parents to earn a living by working outside the home and this is

true for all countries (Kasy & Ramos-Chaves, 2011, p. 2). Costa Rican poverty is also very high

because of education. If Costa Ricans who did not obtain a high school diploma earned as much

as those who did, the extreme poverty rate would be cut in half. In order to achieve this goal

education needs to be a priority. In comparison to other countries, Costa Rica has not kept up

with educational spending, which is essential to benefit from globalization. Costa Rica is also

20% more expensive than the average Latin American country. The inflation rate has an extreme

effect on the poor (Mitchell, 2014, pp. 4). The last cause of extreme poverty is that agricultural

protectionism impacts the poorest Costa Rican residents. In 1990, Costa Rica opened its

imports, but still has high tariffs on key agricultural items including rice, chicken, milk, and

beans. These foods make up basic staples of an average diet (Mitchell, 2014, pp. 5).
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Due to these numerous issues, Costa Rica has not been able to reduce their poverty rate.

In order to reduce the rate throughout the whole country, the government may want to consider

creating a neutral currency exchange rate, the abolishment of agricultural tariffs, and eliminating

regulations that consist of competitive taxation toward businesses. Implementing these changes

would not only help reduce the high poverty rate, but it might also help Costa Rica in the global

market and free trade initiatives (Mitchell, 2014, pp. 7). President Luis Guillermo Sols has also

been trying to combat the stagnant poverty rate by partnering with Oxford University in order to

improve the countrys social assistance programs. Currently there are already twenty-two social

assistance programs set up in Costa Rica and there is a relatively high amount of money being

put into them, but Costa Rica is still struggling to make these programs work (Mitchell, 2014, pp.

3). In 2001, a new law was put into place called Ley de Paternidad Responsible which

mandates DNA tests for presumptive fathers unwilling to recognize their children. This law is

important because a large majority of the poverty rate involves single mothers with children.

The law has made it easier for single mothers to get child support money from the fathers and

has seemed to help some of the family structures (Kasy & Ramos-Chaves, 2011, p. 4).

In Costa Rica, gender and poverty has often been closely related. Conditional cash

transfers (CCTs) are the centerpiece of the new generation of Latin American social policy

having reached over a hundred million poor Latin Americans. CCTs are aimed neither at

promoting nor deterring gender equality. They highlight these gender relations as an important

mediator between people and public policy. Although CCTs are trying to help combat poverty,

there are many people who believe that they dont treat people as people, but rather as subjects or

objects. These CCT programs are currently in place in seventeen of the eighteen Latin American

countries. Based on the experiences in Mexico, their programs provide government assistance to
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poor families only if their mothers send their children to school and for regular healthcare check-

ups. Since these programs in Mexico were implemented there has shown improvements in

school attendance, nutrition, and a drop in income inequality. So if CCT programs can work in

other Latin American countries, it wouldnt hurt to try and combat the poverty in Costa Rica

(Franzoni & Voorend, 2012, p. 384).

Ecotourism is also a very big industry in Latin America, especially in Costa Rica. Costa

Rica is the first country to adopt travel and ecotourism as a way to produce economic

development and employment. The government uses the revenue from ecotourism to help in

paying the countries debt, but is ultimately hurting the natives of the country (Ecotourism and

social development, p. 115). Before ecotourism, families and neighbors were brought together

by nature. Families would build communities around the nature that would help sustain them in

their everyday lives. The towns used to cultivate everything and lived as a community in which

they used the forest as material and cultural wealth. The trees would produce all the fruits that

they needed and the forests would supply beans, meat, and fish. As the forests disappeared, so

did the wealth. Supermarkets, electricity, and highways took their place and the people in those

communities now had to go out and make their own living. Nature used to provide the

livelihoods for the majority of Costa Ricans, but as ecotourism takes over they lose more and

more of the nature. Ecotourism may produce more jobs and revenue for the government, but it

doesnt help the majority of citizens residing in Costa Rica (Ecotourism and social development,

p. 117).

Although poverty is in every country all over the world, the Costa Rican government

needs to look at its policies and start to make a vast amount of changes if they want to grow as a
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country and ultimately cut their national poverty rate. A country itself cannot succeed if its

citizens are in desperate need of the basic staples of life.

United States of America

Many people believe America to be a great land full of opportunity and wealth. The

United States can sometimes live up to expectations, but to many citizens already living here

their dreams are shattered as they sit and live in extreme poverty.

There are many causes for poverty within the United States ranging from education to

income distribution. A very large number of Americans, about 30% of the work force, are paid

less than they can live on. That means that their wages do not allow them to support their

families or even themselves. Wage theft is also a big deal especially when dealing with people

who already make so little. Wage theft means that an employer can make you work longer hours

than you are actually paid for. Wage theft is illegal, but that doesnt mean it still doesnt happen.

The most recent estimates show that employers steal at least $100 billion a year from low income

wage employees (Ehrenreich, 2016, p. 15).

Today, about 60% of employers now do a credit check before a person can be hired. This

means that if youve been unemployed or have been having financial trouble, you may have a

bad credit score which then means you cant get a job or it at least makes it much harder. This

type of hiring is a vicious cycle (Ehrenreich, 2016, p. 17).

The legal system is another major problem regarding poverty in the United States. It is

estimated that about ten million people a year in the United States are charged with

misdemeanors. Many of the misdemeanors are very minor, but it still leads to hefty fines and

sometimes jail time. Of those ten million people about 75% of them are poor. The average fines
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for misdemeanors range from $200 to $500 and sometimes more. In the past few years cities

have even increased their reasons for giving fines and ticketing. For example, in New Mexico, if

a child is charged twice with truancy, the parent can face a fine of $500 or six months in jail. In

Illinois, the parents of an absent child can be fined $1,500 or thirty days in jail. These types of

punishments arent helping the children at all. Education is very important in this country

regarding income and poverty. If a child isnt attending school on a regular basis, taking the

parent out of his/her life may increase the problem (Ehrenreich, 2016, p. 18).

Homelessness is another growing issue. In the United States it is basically illegal to be

homeless. Being homeless is having no place to live indoors so these people sit on park benches,

sleep under bridges, lay down, and use the restroom outside. All of those activities are illegal

and you can be arrested and fined. As a homeless person fines and arrests only further the

problem. As a homeless person you cannot pay the fines and with an arrest record it makes it

even more difficult to find a job. In cities there are no major laws that provide food, shelter, or

restroom to homeless people so they are left to look after themselves. In Orlando, Florida it is

even illegal to help the poor. There are laws against sharing food with poor people in public

places. If a person is to share food, they can be arrested. It makes citizens scared to help the

poor in fear that they will be arrested for having compassion for others. Some homeless people

even commit crimes in order to go to jail. They know that in jail they will have food, water, and

shelter so for them jail is much better than living on the streets. Since the government has started

to realize this, forty-one states have now started charging room and board to be in jail at around

$1 a day. It doesnt seem like much, but as a homeless person it can add up. These people are in

jail because they cant afford lawyers, fines, food, and shelter so when they are released they will

just have a huge bill owed to the correctional facilities (Ehrenreich, 2016, p. 19).
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To help solve the poverty problem, President Obama wants to raise the national minimum

wage. It sounds like a nice idea, but even raising the minimum wage to $10 or $15 an hour

wouldnt help that much. It takes about $24 an hour to live at a very basic level in states like

New York and Virginia (Ehrenreich, 2016, p. 16). Many things need to change in order to help

the poor within the United States. First, the government and businesses need to stop wage theft

by employers so that the employees can make what they are supposed to. Employers should also

stop treating low-wage workers as criminals with constant drug testing and suspicions of theft.

Credit scores should also stop being checked when interviewing for a job. A persons past credit

score has no depiction of how they will be as an employee. Homeless people should also have

more support with government assistance programs instead of being treated like animals. It is

incredibly difficult to crawl your way out of a bad situation. The United States needs to stop

kicking people who are already down and instead try to bring them back up (Ehrenreich, 2016, p.

20-21).

Part II

As our plane was descending into the San Jose airport, I could already see the extreme

poverty from above. I knew even before we hit the ground that it was going to be hard looking

at and experiencing the extreme poverty that is a reality in Costa Rica. I have seen different

forms of poverty in the United States, but never as bad as what I experienced in Costa Rica. The

worst part is that I know we didnt even see the worst, most impoverish parts of the country. In

Costa Rica you see various different types of structures. Theyre made out of sheets of cloth,

wood, or sheets of metal. These people take whatever they can find to make themselves a home.

There are tons of neighborhoods of shanty towns. Theyre very small and dirty. I dont believe

that the majority of them have any sort of running water, plumbing, or electric. Although its a
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very sad reality, I tried to find the positives in it. In the United States it is essentially illegal to be

homeless. Americans cannot build shanty homes, if they did they would probably be arrested

and then the structure would be torn down. I felt as though if people in America were allowed to

build communities like the Costa Ricans it would get more people off the streets and give them

some time to collect themselves and try to be better.

My focus was on poverty and not education, but I think that they both go together. In a

previous article that I mentioned, it said that if Costa Ricans made as much as people with high

school diplomas then the poverty rate would be cut in half. I feel some similarities between that

statement and the United States and many other countries. People with a higher education tend

to make more money, but in Costa Rica children are not required to go to school. While we did

visit a few schools, they were all small and they were not forced to attend. Education should be

required in all countries not just in Costa Rica. In the United States it is illegal to not send your

child to school, but students of age can still drop out of high school. Education and income go

together and if the governments of each country took the time to improve their educational

system I really do believe it would decrease the national poverty rates and overall improve each

country.
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References

Bradley, J. (2013, July). Poverty in Costa Rica. The Borgen Project. Retrieved from

http://borgenproject.org/poverty-in-costa-rica/

Chant, Sylvia. (2009). The feminisation of poverty in Costa Rica: To what extent a

conundrum? Bulletin of Latin American Research, 28(1), 19-43.

Ecotourism and social development. Ecotourism as Social Development, 114-131. Retrieved

from file:///D:/Chapter%206%20-%20Ecotourism.pdf

Ehrenreich, B. (2016). Class matters. Anglican Theoretical Review, 98(1), 15-21.

Franzoni, J. M., & Voorend, K. (2012). Blacks, whites, or grays? Conditional transfers and

gender equality in Latin America. Social Politics, 19(3), 383-407.

Kasy, M. & Ramos-Chaves, A. (2011). Family structures and the female income distribution in

Costa Rica. Los Angeles, California.

Mitchell, B. (2014, December 2). Costa Rica: A stagnant poverty rate in a growing economy.

Southern Pulse. Retrieved from http://www.spcorrespondents.com/blog/costa-rica-a-

stagnant-poverty-rate-in-a-growing-economy