B2 – Upper Intermediate
Poverty is one of the worst parts of society and is a major contributor to economic inequality. When people are in poverty, most governments give relief funds to help.
However, when they start being able to work, they find out that they are losing money, which encourages those in poverty to stop working, and so the next generations, and the cycle continues. This is known as the welfare trap.
To find out more, let’s watch this video about the paradox of poverty.
Discussion Questions:
- What strategies can the government use to prevent the welfare trap from happening?
- In your opinion, is the welfare trap important to try and fix?
- Have you heard or seen anyone stuck in this trap? Talk about them.
- What do you think about the universal basic income or free money with no strings attached?
- What are some government programs that address the issue of poverty in your country?
6 replies on “Why Is It so Hard to Escape Poverty?”
What strategies can the government use to prevent the welfare trap from happening?
Maybe looking for a solution to prevent the welfare trap is very difficult because each society is different but the governments can implement harder requirements to have these helps. I think we need to improve the helps about the education and formation because when the people have a good formation about specific skills they will can improve their economic I mean they will have a good jobs.
In your opinion, is the welfare trap important to try and fix?
Yes, of course. When in the our society has people in this trap it’s very difficult go out from it. Perhaps we can help them with other kind of help I mean education about money or something like that.
Have you heard or seen anyone stuck in this trap? Talk about them.
Maybe the old people and young people. When a young boy wan’t finish or not finish the obligatory education it’s probably they get some help from the government to have money to living. When this event start and the young boy see he can living with out work it’s start the trap and the older people maybe they have a lot of difficult to looking for a job because they are old and the companies don’t hired them.
What do you think about the universal basic income or free money with no strings attached?
We need to have requirement about these helps. The free money doesn’t exist because this money is from the society we all pay for it with taxes and another invoices.
What are some government programs that address the issue of poverty in your country?
I saw in the past a lot of formation about the specific skills for example in IT or other sectors. Maybe is a good investment to society invest in to formation. I think is a good solution to go out from the welfare trap and from the poverty.
It’s good that you are doing what you can to practice and improve your writing skills through this exercise.
Take a careful look at better expressions you can use in this sentence:
Welcome to the Phoneenglish blog! Until next time!
What strategies can the government use to prevent the welfare trap from happening?
– Eliminated government assistance.
– Maintain the government assistance even after find a job.
– Providing other benefits like childcare, education, medical assistant.
In your opinion, is the welfare trap important to try and fix?
– Yes, if the person is healthy and can work, it’s important do it.
Have you heard or seen anyone stuck in this trap? Talk about them.
-Yes, but with older people, that also have more difficult to study or find a job. Then with the government assistance they are less motivated to search a job. It would be nice if the government offer assistance to old person to study and relocate in the world of work.
What do you think about the universal basic income or free money with no strings attached?
-Maybe in the future is needed if they are less job because the advanced of the technology. But I only see possible if the country is very rich and the life is cheeper. Then I see good have a little money only to survive. But I think it’s more important teach and motivate people to study or work.
What are some government programs that address the issue of poverty in your country?
– Basic income for COVID crisis.
– Becas to study or rent
You did exert efforts in practicing your writing for sure. To improve, make sure to be as elaborate as possible in your answers. For your response to the last question, perhaps you can write those in complete sentences and try to discuss each program to express better.
In addition, here is one sentence you can revise:
Keep going with this exercise to improve further.
Is the welfare trap, when pushed to another level, capable to transform an entire society in a useless society? Which is the role of monetary incentives in the development of knowledge or invention? Is it good or bad, for a society that their components, the people that form the society, are more worried about how to make ends meet by the end of the month rather than having enough time to develop their capabilities and interests to find new ways to approach old problems? Should we give everybody basic means of survival, in order they can thrive, or would they become lazy and useless?
Those are the questions every developed society is trying to answer. Mostly when a foreseeable future of employments taken by robots, threatens unqualified workers to condemn them to structural poverty.
Unfortunately, most of the time the answers given to those questions are more related to personal backgrounds or ideological positionings than to a true knowledge of the matter.
Furthermore, when an educated answer is given, by people who has studied the matter, it is always a theoretical answer, since very few located experiences have been launched in the world, and all of them are very limited in beneficiaries and time.
The universal basic income is a very expensive initiative with no certain results. Would rich and powerful people, even in countries known for their excellent and vastly expanded welfare systems, accept to pay – via tax increases – for those kind of initiatives with uncertain results?
Would workers accept to have the taxes they pay increased to assure minimum incomes to a part of the society?
It does not seem that any society in the world is prepared to implement a true Universal Basic Income system, that is why, for the time being, the best policy countries of the world can implement is to provide universal access to the health and education systems.
Poverty is never a choice. No one chooses to be poor. Thus, a mature and fair society has to assume that some people will never thrive, and it is a question of social justice to support them.
Is it the Universal Basic Income the solution? Maybe it is not.
You always strive to do your best in this exercise. Impressive work!
Here is a sentence you can slightly improve:
Continue doing this.