ISLAMABAD: Not many blame bad governance or poor policies of the previous governments for poverty in Pakistan. For majority in Pakistan, they are poor because of sheer bad luck.
According to a Gallup Pakistan National Survey, 43 per cent believe it is because of bad luck that they remained poor. Around 15 percent think it is because they are not hard workers, 44 percent say that it is because they were born in poor families, 9 percent think it is because they did not go abroad for employment.
There are 20 percent who think that it is because they do not earn through illegitimate means, while 11 percent attributed their poverty to illiteracy whereas only one percent of the respondents to Gallup Pakistan survey named other factors as the reason for poor people being poor.
The same survey was conducted in 1981 (33 years ago). At that time 50 percent Pakistanis believed that poor people were poor because of bad luck, 40 percent believed it was because they were born in a poor family.
This data was released by Gallup Pakistan History Project which aims to release historical empirical polling data to wider audiences. The objective is to sustain and encourage empirical decision making in Pakistan.
Thirty-three years ago, a nationally representative sample of men and women, from across the four provinces was asked “What are the reasons for people being poor?” Responding to this question, 17 percent respondents said it was because they were not hard workers, 50 percent said it was because of bad luck, 40 percent said it was because they were born in poor families, 13 percent said it was because they did not go abroad for employment, 18 percent said it was because they did not earn through illegitimate means, while 31 percent attributed their poverty to illiteracy. Five per cent of the respondents named other factors as the reason for poor people being poor.
Apart from decline in respondents who named illiteracy as the reason for poverty, results for all other factors were almost the same in both surveys with “Just bad luck” and “They were born in a poor family” once again being mentioned by a high percentage of respondents. Gallup Pakistan has been polling in Pakistan since 1979 (over 35 years).
IANS
