In an interconnected and interdependent world, political discourses in different parts of the planet have become more similar, even in different regions such as the United States and Latin America.
We know the impact of poverty and corruption concerns on elections in Latin America. But how effective are these two factors in US politics, especially in the midterm elections on Tuesday, November 8th?
To answer this question, it may be helpful to first establish the seriousness of the problem in the United States, compared to what is happening in Latin America.
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In general, poverty problems in Latin American countries differ from those experienced in the United States.
It is also true that the general perception of corporate corruption is more serious in many Latin American countries.
But that doesn’t mean that concerns about poverty and corruption don’t affect the US elections, as several experts have told the BBC’s Spanish-language service, BBC News Mundo.
Both are seen, in many cases, as recurring problems that persuade Americans to vote in one way or another.
different orders of magnitude
Of course, comparing poverty in the world’s most powerful nation, the United States, with that of Latin American countries is complex.
Being considered poor in the United States isn’t what it is like elsewhere.
According to the US Census Bureau, a family of two adults and two children in that country is classified as poor if the family income does not exceed $26,000 (R$134,000) per year. About 12% of the US population falls into this category.
However, as an example, a family earning the same amount in Colombia equivalent to about 10 million Colombian pesos per month would be considered part of the middle class of the South American country.
When trying to compare poverty in the US with that of Latin American countries, the constant changes in the value of the respective currencies, differences in the cost of living, availability of government assistance, and other socioeconomic factors make the value of the salary the only variable to consider, not the salary itself.
The World Bank sought to create an index that takes into account some of these differences in cost of living and monetary values to estimate what percentage of the population lives under $2.15 a day, adjusted for the purchasing power of different currencies.
They thus arrive at an estimate of the number of people in each country facing the challenges of extreme poverty.
Measured in this way, 1% of the US population is in this state of absolute poverty.
Under this method, there is less extreme poverty in Chile, where this vulnerable population makes up 0.7% of the total. On the other hand, according to the World Bank, Mexico reaches 3.1 percent, Guatemala 9 percent, Colombia 10.8 percent, Honduras 12.7 percent and Haiti 29 percent.
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The United Nations has another mechanism, the Human Development Index, which, in addition to salary, examines how much of the population has access to material well-being.
In the 0 to 1 index, where 1 reflects the communities with the highest human development, Chile scores 0.855, very close to the 0.92 achieved by the US.
Mexico, Brazil and Colombia get 0.75. Bolivia only reaches 0.6, while Haiti barely reaches 0.53.
Finally, there is the prism of relative poverty and inequality.
In many countries, the political impact of poverty is heightened by feelings of inequality.
If the poor feel that the rich have too much, they can increase their anger towards the system.
The Gini index measures the degree of inequality in a society. The smaller the number, the smaller the inequality.
According to the information received from the World Bank, this index reaches 41.5 for the USA. The same index ranks Uruguay at 40.2, an equally more egalitarian society.
The Gini index, on the other hand, rose to 48.9 in Brazil and 54.2 in Colombia, one of the world’s worst countries in this regard.
So when comparing poverty and inequality between Latin America and the United States, the first clarification to be made is: Which country are we talking about in Latin America, a region with enormous internal differences in the outcomes of tackling poverty?
Effects on US politics
In any case, experts caution that poverty in the United States, although often significantly lower than in Latin America, has significant policy implications.
That’s what Shailly Barnes, policy director of the Kairos Center, a New York-based think tank looking for solutions to poverty in the US thinks.
“The common narrative about the poor in the United States is that they don’t run in elections and aren’t interested in politics. We’ve seen that this isn’t true. In 2020, nearly 60 million low-income people voted in the presidential election,” he says. Barnes to BBC News World.
He uses an example from the recent 2020 election in Florida to illustrate the relevance of the issue of poverty in the American political world.
He points out that it’s a state that has been defeated by Republicans, a party whose policies have traditionally been associated with greater support for big business. But, recalls Barnes, “that same Florida voter voted in a referendum to increase the current minimum wage in the state.”
But the expert is concerned by the fact that “our policy often does not respond to the needs of these people.”
He warns that, as in many other countries, concerns about poverty in the United States are fueling other political phenomena such as populism.
“We’ve seen this over the past decade,” says Barnes, pointing, for example, to the “use of racist speech” by some politicians in response to a voter concerned about worsening financial well-being.
corruption concerns
In addition to poverty, another recurring topic of discussion in contemporary Latin American politics is corruption.
In general, but not always, measures of perception of corruption outperform US institutions than Latin American countries.
However, no one denies that this is an extremely topical issue in US politics.
Transparency International is one of the organizations that tries to characterize the public perception of the degree of corruption prevalent in many countries and compare it with an index.
The latest version of the index shows Denmark as the country with the lowest perception of corruption, with a score of 88 out of 100.
The United States placed 27th with 67 points, leveling off with Chile and beating 18th-ranked Uruguay with 73 points.
Colombia is ranked 87th with 33 points. Argentina ranks 96th, Brazil, Guatemala 150th and Venezuela 177th, surpassing only three countries in this table: Somalia, Syria and South Sudan.
The corruption debate, in any case, shakes up US policy more than most Latin American countries.
Note that one of the rallying cries in Donald Trump’s triumphant 2016 presidential campaign was the then-candidate promise to “dry the swamp” as he referred to corruption in Washington, a city built on swamps.
This year the debate has mostly focused on allegations of electoral corruption, Gabriel Sanchez, an assistant professor at the Brookings Institution research center in Washington and professor at the University of New Mexico, told BBC News Mundo.
The controversies surrounding the 2020 presidential election and Trump’s defeat have left their mark on the American public’s perception of corruption, despite finding no evidence of fraud in the said elections.
“We’re seeing a record level of misinformation targeting Latinos, especially Spanish-speaking Latinos, this election cycle. Much of this content focuses on Trump’s ongoing allegations of 2020 fraud, which helps create a perception of corruption among some.” Latinos,” says Sanches.
The expert identified the reflections of this debate in the by-elections to be held on Tuesday.
“This is evident in places like Arizona, where there are so many candidates sticking to Trump’s 2020 campaign message on electoral corruption. If there is another tight election now, it may take several days to calculate the results, which could fuel electoral accusations.” fraud. and raises more concerns about corruption.”
In an interconnected and interdependent world, political discourses in different parts of the planet have become more similar, even in different regions such as the United States and Latin America.
Despite showing so many different indicators on issues such as corruption and poverty, citizens’ anger over these issues helps explain at least some of the election results in both places.
– This text was published in: https://www.bbc.com/portuguese/internacional-63559606
source: Noticias
