The Life You Can Save: How to play your part in ending world poverty

by Peter Singer

Conversely, when people appear to act contrary to their own interests, we tend to be suspicious, especially if the action is carefully considered (as opposed to something impulsive like jumping onto a subway track to save someone from being hit by an oncoming train). When celebrities like Angelina Jolie or Madonna support organizations that help the poor, we look for hidden selfish reasons. We readily agree with the suggestion that they are doing it only for the publicity.

“I don’t promise that when a kid lives it will cause a GNP increase. I think life has value.”

Our focus should not be growth for its own sake, but the goals that lie behind our desire for growth: saving lives, reducing misery, and meeting people’s basic needs.

As I see them, neither Esther Greenwood nor Zell Kravinsky nor Paul Farmer is a defective parent. They love their children and want to protect them. Their problem is that they are also pulled by the needs of others in a way that most people are not.

A larger sense of family is a radical idea, but we get into trouble as a society when we don’t see that we’re in the same boat.”

No principle of obligation is going to be widely accepted unless it recognizes that parents will and should love their own children more than the children of strangers, and, for that reason, will meet the basic needs of their children before they meet the needs of strangers. But this doesn’t mean that parents are justified in providing luxuries for their children ahead of the basic needs of others.

Surprisingly, Americans earning less than $20,000 a year actually give a higher percentage of their income—a substantial 4.6 percent—to charity than every other income group until we get to those earning more than $300,000 a year.

I guess basically one wants to feel that one’s life has amounted to more than just consuming products and generating garbage. I think that one likes to look back and say that one’s done the best one can to make this a better place for others. You can look at it from this point of view: What greater motivation can there be than doing whatever one possibly can to reduce pain and suffering?