{"id":145,"date":"2021-04-01T12:24:41","date_gmt":"2021-04-01T16:24:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thejoyfulrich.org\/articles\/?p=145"},"modified":"2026-03-20T14:06:15","modified_gmt":"2026-03-20T18:06:15","slug":"we-have-enough","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thejoyfulrich.org\/articles\/we-have-enough.htm","title":{"rendered":"What Would It Cost to Solve the World\u2019s Problems?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>It\u2019s easy to look at <a href=\"\/articles\/this-is-an-outrage.htm\">the problems in the world today<\/a> and despair. How could we possibly hope to solve them? The surprising reality, though, is that we already have everything we need.<\/p>\n<h2>The Cost<\/h2>\n<p>Let\u2019s start by looking at what it would cost to solve the world\u2019s most pressing needs:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>$6 billion<\/strong> would be enough to strike a death blow to major health issues like polio<sup><a href=\"https:\/\/www.weforum.org\/agenda\/2017\/01\/6-key-numbers-in-the-fight-to-end-polio\/\">1<\/a><\/sup> and malaria<sup><a href=\"https:\/\/www.cfr.org\/backgrounder\/can-malaria-be-eradicated\">2<\/a><\/sup> when combined with what\u2019s already being given by other government and private sources.<\/li>\n<li><strong>$4 billion<\/strong> would end hunger.<sup><a href=\"https:\/\/www.iisd.org\/system\/files\/publications\/ending-hunger-what-would-it-cost.pdf\">4<\/a><\/sup><\/li>\n<li><strong>$150 billion<\/strong> would deliver universal safe water and sanitation, even if no one else gave anything at all.<sup><a href=\"https:\/\/www.reuters.com\/article\/us-global-water-health\/the-cost-of-clean-water-150-billion-a-year-says-world-bank-idUSKCN1B812E\">4<\/a><\/sup><\/li>\n<li><strong>$87.5 billion<\/strong> would end poverty in all forms if the rest of the world <em>combined<\/em> gave the same amount.<sup><a href=\"https:\/\/www.visionofearth.org\/news\/how-much-would-it-cost-to-end-extreme-poverty-in-the-world\/\">5<\/a><\/sup><\/li>\n<li><strong>$39 billion<\/strong> would deliver universal pre-primary, primary, and secondary education of good quality in low- and lower-middle-income countries, even if no one else gave anything at all.<sup><a href=\"https:\/\/unesdoc.unesco.org\/ark:\/48223\/pf0000232197\">6<\/a><\/sup><\/li>\n<li><strong>$53.6 billion<\/strong> would provide comprehensive maternal and newborn support in developing countries, even if no one else gave anything at all.<sup><a href=\"https:\/\/www.guttmacher.org\/fact-sheet\/adding-it-up-contraception-mnh-2017\">7<\/a><\/sup><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>That\u2019s a total of <strong>$340.1 billion<\/strong> \u2014 a massive number when you consider that the entire U.S. foreign aid budget is only <strong>$50 billion<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p>How does it compare to the resources of the American church, though?<\/p>\n<h2>The Power of 8%<\/h2>\n<p>American churchgoers make about <strong>$6 trillion<\/strong> per year \u2014 that\u2019s $<strong>6 <em>thousand<\/em> billion<\/strong> \u2014 and we give 2% of it away.<sup><a href=\"https:\/\/givingusa.org\/\">8<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n<p>What would happen if we took that number to 10%? What could we do with the extra 8%?<\/p>\n<p>Just 5.7% would be enough to cover the <strong>$340.1B<\/strong> to solve the world\u2019s most pressing needs, and we\u2019d <em>still<\/em> have <strong>$138 Billion<\/strong> left \u2014 <em>every year<\/em>. How many Bible translations could be completed for the 1.5 billion people who still don\u2019t have one? How many people could be reached with the Gospel? How many places could remain unreached if we were spending more than the entire U.S. foreign aid budget to reach them?<\/p>\n<p>All because we decided that we could live on 90% of our income!<\/p>\n<h2>Don\u2019t Believe the Numbers?<\/h2>\n<p>We don\u2019t blame you. Putting a dollar figure on most of these issues is challenging, to say the least.<\/p>\n<p>The point, though, is that the cost \u2014 whatever numbers you believe \u2014 is dwarfed by our ability to meet it. It\u2019s not close. These problems are solvable, and God has blessed us with <em>abundant<\/em> resources to do it.<\/p>\n<p>What do you think his expectation is?<\/p>\n<p class=\"photo-credit\">Feature Photo by <a href=\"https:\/\/unsplash.com\/@wildbook\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Dmitry Demidko<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>It\u2019s easy to look at the problems in the world today and despair. How could we possibly hope to solve them? The surprising reality, though, is that we already have everything we need.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":188,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-145","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thejoyfulrich.org\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/145","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thejoyfulrich.org\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thejoyfulrich.org\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thejoyfulrich.org\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thejoyfulrich.org\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=145"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.thejoyfulrich.org\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/145\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":177,"href":"https:\/\/www.thejoyfulrich.org\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/145\/revisions\/177"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thejoyfulrich.org\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/188"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thejoyfulrich.org\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=145"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thejoyfulrich.org\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=145"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thejoyfulrich.org\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=145"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}