After a considerable amount of time since our last post, we’re back from a long summer break. After enjoying the sun and the sand, we have come back to loaning and researching poverty.
As well as coming back, some new members may be recruited, and some members may have left. We will still have plenty of loaners and researchers.
Since our new president, Donald Trump, has come into office, he’s had a lot of plans. One of his plans is to build a wall across our U.S.A-Mexico border.
But is it a good idea?
The wall is going to cost anywhere between 12-15 billion dollars. With that big of a cost, people question it’s values.
What are some of the pros and cons? Well, the main pro is that it will help will with illegal immigration of people and goods, like any drug or product that’s not allowed here.
The main con is the cost. There are lots of other ways that we could use the money. Is it a good idea?
We could use it to help other countries. In 2012, about $37,000,000,000 were sent overseas to other countries like Pakistan, Iraq and Afghanistan.
We could also send it to the bill to end poverty. In order to get rid of most of poverty, we would need to pay $175,000,000 for 20 years per year.
We would to use it to feed hungry children. It takes 20 cents to give a child a meal in parts of Africa. In other parts, it takes as little as $10 to feed kids in refugee camps for 3 weeks.
Lastly, we could build homes with the money. It would cost 40 million dollars to build four homeless shelters. We could build 1500 homeless shelters with that money.
The list goes on, but it’s your choice of what you want to do. You can help in lots of ways, including Kiva, to help stop poverty.
As spring is coming, the flu is going around. Mostly, people get a flu shot and have recovery time. When we get the flu, you and most people are safe.
But for some people, that’s not the case.
So, what is the flu? It’s short for influenza. It’s an extremely contagious respiratory disease.
When the flu comes knocking on your door, you boost your immune system with the shots that we get.
But, shots cost money. Most people can afford shots in America, but in other countries, I can’t say the same.
So when the flu comes knocking on the door of Africa and Mexico, the shots aren’t there to save them.
How much is a flu shot? It’s about an average of 40 dollars at a local pharmacy. At other places, it could be more or less.
So that’s why we need Kiva and other loaning sites. If we help people to have a better life, we are also helping people get the money that they need to get flu shots and be safe.
By: Mathew L.
Everybody likes electronic devices, such as, an phone, iPad, or a computer. In the last decade, everyone has been drawn to the electronics of today.
But, what’s the science behind it…..
If you were to take the case and the cover off your phone, you would find the battery — the thing that powers your phone.
If you weren’t aware, the battery is made out of an element called cobalt. Like almost every other element, cobalt is found underground. The majority of the world’s cobalt comes from the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
The Congo isn’t exactly the richest country. An average person will only make $489 per year. It’s a hard life there.
It isn’t easy to get the cobalt in the first place. The Africans mining the Cobalt in the Congo can spend as much as 24 hours at a time in a dark, cold tunnel, working with poisonous cobalt.
So, the people in the Congo struggle to make a good salary. On a good day of mining, they will dig up about 200-250 pounds of cobalt, but make only make 2-3 dollars.
So while you enjoy the low costs of a new phone battery, people in the Congo are dying of the low salary.
So use the battery that you have, and consider yourself lucky. And then, do everything you can to help places like the DRC. People there deserve a better life.
By: Mathew L. and Carson S.
Edited by: Sofia T and Kayla P
Thanksgiving is a time where we unite with family and eat, a ton! There are other people in the world that don’t spend Thanksgiving this way….
This is one of the downsides of being in poverty: being hungry. This is why we loan. This is why we donate food to the food drive.
World hunger is a problem we as a planet have had lots of trouble with. Almost 800,000,000 people in the world are starving due to world hunger.
So next time you complain for not having any good food, think of people who don’t even get food.
So if you want to help people in the world have Thanksgiving, you can use Kiva to lend, or donate any food to food drives, so we can end world hunger.