Looking Forward - Poverty, Hunger and Homelessness

Today is part three of my "Looking Forward" series. I was originally going to talk about what's next for Iraq, but I was asked to give my thoughts on homelessness and hunger, so I'll save my Iraq post for another time. Since there's really no way to discuss hunger and homelessness without bringing in the root cause for both -- poverty -- I've decided to cover that as well.

When I think of homelessness, I tend to think domestically. When I consider hunger I usually picture true famine and pestilence-related hunger, so I find myself looking overseas. Keep this in mind as you read what I'm about to write. I realize there's foreign homelessness and domestic hunger, but I am going to write based on what I know and understand.

I think I'll start overseas and work my way back home. I hate to say it, but I think that worldwide hunger is going to get worse, not better. Global warming is going to cause a shift in our food production. In the short term, some areas that are currently great for producing food will dry up and become unusable. Some areas that are currently not suitable for food production will become available, but there will be a perpetual lag between when we lose an area and when we find the next one.

As America loses clout in the global economy, our society will provide progressively less humanitarian aid -- another cause for the increase in global hunger. Other nations will eventually step in to fill our shoes, but not before a considerable number of people die of malnutrition and disease.

To complicate matters further, the world will continue to convert food to fuel at an increasing rate as oil prices rise still further. As we continue to convert food to fuel, there will be less and less food available to combat global hunger. Many countries with a small middle class and a large disparity between the rich and poor (think Mexico, Russia and China) will see a surge in hunger among the poorer citizens. This is already happening in Mexico. As hunger persists and worsens, many of these governments will become unstable due to rioting.

The final complication in global hunger is our birth rate. I predict little to no change in our overall population growth rate. More people + less food = more hunger. I think that we will one day accept genetically modified food, which will eventually alleviate this problem, but this is more than a decade away.

Bringing the focus toward our own borders, I predict a small, short-term increase in hunger due to my predicted stagflation, and the increased price of food caused by converting food to fuel. However, this will be short-lived as we decide to keep more of our own food instead of sending it overseas, and there will be a government-sponsored increase in food stamps.

I see no appreciable change in our homeless situation. In the short term, people will lose their homes, but most will retain enough employment to at least live in an apartment. In the long term, I see the pay gap between the rank-and-file workers and CEOs narrowing considerably over the next five to ten years. This will put more money in the hands of the middle class, which will grow and expand, but the rate of homelessness will remain essentially unchanged.

Again, all of this ties into poverty. I don't think there will be much change in overall poverty. Some third world economies will finally hit their stride (as China and India have in the last decade or two), and established economies will continue to expand (except for the U.S., who will remain essentially stagnant). But the poorest of the poor will remain left behind.