The Deserving Poor (and Other Fictions)
I have been asked – repeatedly, across centuries, in various formulations – to explain the difference between the “deserving poor” and the “undeserving poor.”
I have a counter-question: what is the difference between the “deserving rich” and the “undeserving rich”?
This question is never asked, which tells you everything you need to know about who designed the categories.
The Sorting Machine
The concept of the “deserving poor” is one of history’s most effective tools of social control. It works by dividing the poor into two groups: those who are poor through no fault of their own (the ill, the elderly, the widowed) and those who are poor because of some personal failing (laziness, immorality, bad choices).