LT-7:You don't have a civil society if the majority of people become desperately poor and you don't have peace and prosperity that way, either. You need a very large and thriving middle class and as little as possible actual poverty and a REASONABLE spread between "haves" and "have not so much" types.
Example: Very few were very rich in France and many were starving back in the 1700's. Result: French Revolution, which I believe anyone in their right mind wouldn't consider civil, peaceful or prosperous.
Europe was in the middle of the Little Ice Age at the time of the French Revolution. Unlike other countries the French Peasants refused to give up their grain based diets in favor of root crops such as potatoes, carrots and turnips. Yes they were starving, more as an outcome of their own failure to evolve as other countries did during this period. So the fault is not entirely that of the govt. The French King tried to get them to adapt and they wouldn't, so crop failure after crop failure ensued as a result of the weather.
As to the poor you must be referring to some workers paradise like Cuba, or Venezuela. You sure aren't talking about the US. Poverty figures are skewed due to the current method of computing them, welfare, and social programs are not counted. If you are poor or starving in this country it is due to some other factor then our economic situation, even the dogass illegals from the south get on welfare.
jackg
