The immorality of poverty

"Which is better? Sending man to the moon or feeding him earth?" This quote, plastered on the wall behind the information desk in the National Civil Rights Museum, hit me when we first walked in.

As we continued through the museum, the exhibit mentioned that Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was against the Vietnam War because he thought it was wasting much needed money. It detailed the concept of the immorality of poverty. We grow up knowing that poverty is horrible and to be grateful for all that we have, but the idea that poverty is actually immoral was new to me. Although it was new I realized its accuracy immediately. It is immoral to sit around and watch people starve when a lot could be done both by the government and us to fix that. The US spends more money on the military than any other country yet the poverty rate was 16% as of 2012. This means that 1 in 7 people still suffer from poverty.