I'm Born one In a poor family, in a family, I'm an awesome person to have my sister with me. Mother with us is our hardest silk to enrich. Dad was leaving us with a solo crazy play. Wherever my mother went to work on the ropes, we were eating raisins, peanut butter and rice. Where the neighbor is teasing everything. I have a sore throat.
These cash cards came with caveats; you can only use them at approved shops and only for items on an approved list.
Welfare recipients wouldn’t get all their payments on JKM — apparently only 50 but that still meant half of their allowance would be limited to certain uses only.
Behind on your rent? Need to pay a medical bill? Too bad. JKM Pay would be the supposed rationale is to help welfare recipients plan their finances better.
After reading up on JKM, for a brief moment, I felt an overwhelming desire for physical violence.
The problem with people who do not understand the challenges of being poor is they think that the poor can budget their way out of poverty.
I am middle-class and have the option to switch phone plans (which I just did) to save some money.
To reduce my phone bill, I chose a much lower data plan, unsubscribed Netflix and instead paid RM5 monthly for streaming service.
The average poor person does not have as many options and must make do with what they have.
A salaried worker will get a car. But those who do odd jobs such as collecting cans and boxes for recycling can never truly predict how much money they will make a month.
I saw some people say that JKM Pay prevents people from wasting the money on cigarettes, alcohol or, horror, drugs.
If you think like I would first like to say, you should check your empathy tank as it seems to be running on empty.
This moral about how the poor should spend their money is also part of the whole myth that the poor are that way because they chose to be.
It’s also why too many of us admire the rich and ascribe virtue to wealth to this fantastical notion that wealthy people “worked hard” to get where they are.
Never mind that the average CEO salary has quadrupled over the while the average Malaysian factory worker still earns what they did in the 80s.
The simple solution is really to just give poor people money. Yes, there will be some who will buy themselves a beer or a carton or two of cigarettes.
Why must we deny aid to the people who will instead use it to ensure their children have enough to eat when going to school or that instead of eating only rice and salt, they have fresh vegetables and occasionally a little meat and eggs?
Let’s not even start on poor Malaysians being shamed about their dietary choices when those but nutritious poke bowls cost around RM20 but a few rights.
In sometimes all I could afford was one a day and if hunger got the better of me, perhaps some instant noodles before bed.
To be continued...
Super
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