Live Below the Line

[Eriny]

Live Below the Line, if you haven't heard, is a slightly more reflective version of 40 hour famine. You get AU$2 a day for food to live on for five days in order to experience what living below the poverty line is like. Except the people who do it tend to gorge themselves on food after they have finished, lol. It's interesting in seeing how far/not far $10 for five days worth of food goes, and it is a way to raise money for charity, people (me included) just question its effectiveness.

Two contradictory articles from GOOD magazine:

anti live below the line - http://www.good.is/post/let-s-stop-doing-these-pretend-to-be-poor-experiments

pro live below the line - http://www.good.is/post/rebuttal-it-s-not-playing-poor-it-s-symbolic-action/

What do you think?

[MuggedByReality]

   I think people would do better to read this:
    http://www.dambisamoyo.com/books/?book=dead-aid

[Eriny]

That sounds really interesting! I do suspect that charity and especially aid are overall quite ineffective solutions that if anything tend to hide problems rather than solve them. What way does the book suggest we proceed with development issues?

I went to a public lecture on this topic a fews ago and apparently aid effectiveness is difficult to study, partly because the government wants everyone to think that it is effective and partly because NGOs also have a vested interest in getting more money, regardless of how effective it is. In addition, there are a lack of independent parites to measure this.