The undeserving poor

"if you have enough money to buy a massive flat-screen TV, who are you to bitch and moan about how poor you are anyway, and how the taxpayer isn't subsidizing a good enough apartment for you?"

How do you know she bought it? Maybe it was a gift. Maybe it was owned by a family member or friend who died. Or maybe she did buy it in a stupid financial decision that is typical of people in poverty regardless of their "nobility' and "worthiness."

Listen, maybe she is a "welfare queen"--which is clearly what you are inferring--or maybe that television is the only major "thing' she owns in her life. Who knows. But deciding whether someone is the "deserving poor" based on a single picture is pretty dangerous and shows a fairly simplistic understanding of poverty.

While this woman cracks me up, she probably shouldn't be a poster child for who the poor are. But people like her sure get under my skin. She has a large HDTV, a larger kitchen than I have, hardwood floors and she sits there and complains about a leaky faucet and a warped door?! I have mutiple doors in my house that stick, are warped, or don't close easily, and don't get me started on plumping issues. It's called a home, it's not perfect. Stop complaining!

The deserving poor? Well--I know the Catholic Charities in our city takes care of homeless families who have fallen on some hard times. Perhaps they made a few bad choices or didn't plan, but in some of the post-industrial cities these sorts of things happen.

The people who DO get under my skin are the damn pan-handlers. You can't even walk outside your own apartment without one of these jerks trying to pimp you for money, walk in front of your path, or shake a coin cup in your face. I'm of the opinion that most of them have a scam going. Indianapolis really does take pretty good care of its homeless.

Regarding the TV: I'll bet that she is purchasing it from a rent to own company paying relatively small amounts each month, only to end up paying thousands more than the TV is actually worth. There is very good research that shows that RTOs typically charge interest rates that are in double and even triple digits.

Regarding the worthy v unworthy poor: Absolutely every able-bodied and able-minded person should work. But I would suggest that our definition of work but evaluated...perhaps a stay at home mom (regardless of external sources of income) is a working mom and deserves some assistance. If we believe that children benefit from a mother staying at home...perhaps most/all children would benefit, not just those who have middle or upper class incomes.

It's also possible that she received a large amount of money--unpaid child support, a Social Security disability backpayment--and was forced to spend it down quickly, since poor people are not allowed to have bank accounts with more than a $1,000 or $2,000 if they want to keep things like Medicaid or get food stamps or stay in public housing. We expect poor people to be financially responsible or truly destitute to be considered "deserving," but put up roadblocks that prevent that kind of responsibility if they want to keep a roof over their heads or medication in their medicine cabinet.

I don't particularly like the distinction deserving vs. undeserving. Maybe it's necessary, given the limited resources we have to help others, and I certainly am annoyed when I hear of or see spendthrifts who feel entitled to other people's money while I'm forgoing luxuries they have, but I see a beggar, I try not to evaluate how deserving he is. If I have cash, I will give him some. Even that seems insufficient to me, but I don't have the guts to start talking to him and see how I could really help. It seems to me that anyone who feels it necessary to beg strangers for money deserves at least some help, for pity's sake.

This situation reminds me of a (possibly apocryphal) story about C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien. They were walking to a pub in Oxford, and passed a beggar. Tolkien stopped and gave him some money. Afterwards, Lewis remonstrated him: "Why did you give him money? All he'll do is spend it on alcohol." Tolkien responded, "that's all I was going to spend it on." When I fail to give money to the poor, is it really because I'm going to use it better, give it to a more worthy cause or provide for the needs of my family? Is it so that I can buy that novel I've been wanting to get, or a more expensive bottle of wine, or a fancy dinner? I dread one day having to ask, "Lord, when did I see you hungry..."

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Am I a horrible human being for thinking that this is perverse?
Posted by: Richard | December 21, 2007 10:17 AM
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Well, it certainly sound intrinsically disordered...

But seriously, interest on school loans should be tax-deductible

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Well, it certainly sound intrinsically disordered...
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That's the way I like it, actually.

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John E. Interest on student loans is tax-deductible.
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Not if you're AGI's above about 95K.

Marian,

I don't think anyone on this board would classify the folks you're talking about as "undeserving poor." The salient question is this: When dispensing public welfare benefits should we try to distinguish these folks who are genuinely hard up because of circumstances beyond their control from the folks who will continue to rely on the system because they won't save even what little they have for a rainy day.

Or, are you saying that merely classifying the poor into "deserving" and "undeserving" constitutes slander?

In answer to the original question, most of the time, we don't and can't know whether a particular poor person is "deserving" or "undeserving." Maimonides, a medieval Jewish philosopher, says that G-d allows phony beggars to exist, in order to provide stingy people who don't give to beggars the benefit of the doubt. It's almost a statistical setup--if one out of every five beggars is a phony, the person who doesn't give to beggars is only 80% liable for violating the commandment to "give to your brother in need."

"responding to the pleas of beggars" is not all that much an "occasional" thing, at least in large cities. It is a daily test of one's beliefs and one's willingness to act on them. There are a lot of different ways to respond to panhandlers, but I think the whole issue is one of the best subjects of New Year's resolutions, which it might be good to start thinking about right about now. (A lot better than the "eat better, exercise, lose weight" litany most of us seem to come up with.)

Poverty is not always a result of "bad decisions." Sometimes it is a result of not being able to get a full-time job with benefits, a problem afflicting an increasing number of Americans these days. Part-time, temporary, no-benefit jobs are not intended to support anybody but the individual worker. If s/he is foolish enough to have a family, that's her/his problem. People in that situation may be able to make it from day to day and week to week as long as nothing out of the ordinary pops up. Of course, something always does…

I think there’s a difference between working people who can’t get ahead and live on the edge, and people who are chronically poor. I think that the chronically poor have a fundamentally different relationship with “the system” than the rest of us do. Most of us were raised to understand that if we learned how to read, write, and cipher, got a job, got there on time every day, and were reasonably productive, we’d end up being self-sufficient and more or less secure, if not necessarily wealthy. But some people – probably including the HDTV woman in this article – never, never learn that. They’re not raised to know or see it. They absolutely do not see themselves as having any control over their economic circumstances. It’s not enough to teach them skills and tell them to get a job – how do we, as a society, change their understanding of how to live in this world?

I bet that most people on this board could be dropped into a strange city with $50 in their pocket and the clothes on their back, and within some amazingly short amount of time be back on their feet – in a rooming house, working at Taco Time, shopping at the thrift store, probably, but still self-sufficient and looking forward. By the same token, you can teach a chronically poor person a skill, settle them in a job and an apartment or room they can afford on their wages, and NOT be sure that in a year they won’t be back on public assistance. How do we change that? How do we ensure that THEIR children learn to be part of the system?

Mrs. Pringle

Wow, the comment thing didn't like my French quotation marks. The blanks in the comment above are 'nouveaux-riches' and 'nouveaux-pauvres.'

It's materialism. We see it at work in the middle and upper middle class and maybe tsk tsk at it, or maybe just join in and justify it by telling ourselves, "well, I work hard."

What many people who haven't spent time with the poor don't realize is that materialism is literally tearing many of these folks apart. In many neighborhoods, kids can live their whole lives without leaving their own zip code. Their view to the outside world is MTV. Whoever said that what a lot of these folks want is respect is correct. Very true. However, if you talk to poor people there is a rather pervasive presumption that in order to get respect, you have to have money. Or at least stuff. So when they do get a bit of money, they will spend it on stuff that people can see rather than on more responsible things which won't quickly pay off in terms of increased respecct.

Dave Chappelle did a funny sketch about a guy living in the 'hood who got a job at McDonalds. He was probably the only guy on the block with a legal job, but everyone clowned him about working at McDonalds, none of the women would give him the time of day, in short his honest, albiet not prestegious, work did nothing to earn him respect. Unfortunately, this is pretty close to the truth.

I had a friend who at age 15 told me that a guy needed to have "the 3 c's": cute, car and cash. I was like, "we're 15. How's he going to have a car and cash? Can't you come up with anything more romantic than that?" But she thought she was setting her standards high. Today she's a single mom with 2 kids, struggling to make ends meet. She came from a poor neighborhood and her parents tried to do everything they could to provide her with more opportunities for her life, but she had internalized the ethos of the neighborhood: money is what counts. Money is what gets you respect. Money is what will give you a shot at love.

I don't know how you fix it, but IMO it really is our materialistic culture which is feeding the beast. The poor are really the canary in the coal mine of a society, I think. They react the most quickly and dramatically to the sicknesses of a society. Whatever is wrong in our society is amplified in the poor. And we shouldn't fool ourselves into thinking that it's their problem. I'm pretty sure that we're going to see more and more results of this rampant materialism in the larger community. The sub-prime melt-down is one. There will be others coming. The only thing we can do, really is try and change the culture to value character, work for work's sake, stable families and modest living.

Part of the reality of today is that the rules have changed. No longer is it "if you show up to work and are reasonably productive, you will become self-sufficient." The economy has changed dramatically. Factory jobs that are yours until you retire are long gone. The idea that if I work hard for the employer he will keep me on is also long gone.

If you want to explore the reality of this, talk with the former Amana/Maytag workers in Newton, IA, or the former Maytag workers in Galesburg, IL. Or you can check with the former BNSF workers in Burlington, IA, or the former Case/IH workers in Burlington and Bettendorf, IA.

A few years ago the local Case/IH plant laid off dozens of welders, all union members being paid good wages. This was done at the same time a new factory opened in town, which made offers to the new unemployed welders that were significantly lower, had less benefits, and were non-union. Amazingly the new company was owned by the same folks who owned JI/Case. These workers played by the rules, were proud of the quality of work they did for the company, and were rewarded with as much as a 25% wage cut. Of course some would say that they should be happy to still have a job, and given the nature of this economy that may be the case.

My point is that the idea of an "undeserving poor" cannot be allowed to obscure the real problems faced by a growing number of Americans who, having played by the rules and bought into the Protestant work ethic, find that their employer no longer plays by those rules.

Job security does not exist for a growing segment of people. They play by the rules, and they lose.

Don't let Ms. HDTV's situation cause us to forget this.

And for the record, I do think that our economy has gotten out of wack as well. I don't mean to discount that reality. However, I think it's pretty clear that there are people who would remain in poverty even if our economic system worked better for those at the bottom.

Also, regardless of the economy, it seems to me that there's a poverty mentality which is creeeping ever upwards. I have a single, childless, 26 year old sister who is making 42K a year and considers herself poor. She struggles to pay her electric bill, but owns dozens of pairs of $150 jeans and cannot understand what one has to do with the other.

When I was poor (really poor), when I would get down, I would tell myself, "I live better than kings and queens in the past. I have running water, a flush toilet. I can take a hot shower whenever I want. My apartment is 70 degrees even though it's 10 below outside. I have hot coffee and can get in my car to travel where I want to go. I'm doing OK." But being able to think like this is probably a good part of the reason why I'm not poor anymore.

Now, I have to admit when I think of "deserving" poor, I think of people like my grandfather, who despite having little education and speaking broken English managed to support his wife and six children through the Great Depression by working his butt off at whatever menial jobs he could find. Of course, that is probably a different situation -- they did own a small home just outside of town and had enough of a yard to grow their own vegetables and fruit, raised chickens so they had meat, and my grandmother was skilled in the old-fashioned housewifery; i.e., they were fairly self-sufficient even on a very small income. You know, the old "use it up, wear it out, make it do, or do without" mentality. Which, come to think of it, is a pretty crunchy-con outlook, right?

Of course, that is pretty different situation than a family living in an urban housing project -- can't grow their own vegetables, can't raise chickens, the kids want to wear fancy clothes and bling, not homespun frocks, and no one knows how to make their own soap out of lard and wood ashes anymore.

Which makes me wonder, would the Great Society idea have worked out better if, rather than concentrating the poor into urban developments, there had been some sort of rural-homesteader program instead? Although I guess that smacks too much of a Soviet-style collective for some...and frankly, I think anything the government touches is destined to be a huge mess anyhow.

salamander, my husband has commented now and again, "If only we had gotten that 40 acres and a mule." It wouldn't have made life perfect, but a darn sight better for a lot of folks, I'd wager :)

Rebeccat, I like your way of thinking! My dishwasher recently gave up the ghost, and we can't afford to get a new one for a while (well, we theoretically COULD take advantage of the various credit options offered by the appliance stores, but we have made the decision to only pay cash and thus limit ourselves to what we can actually afford).

I was griping about how much time I now spend washing dishes by hand (amazing how many dishes a family of five goes through in a day!), but then realized how many people in this world don't even HAVE dishes, or even food to put on them, let alone an actual house with hot water flowing RIGHT INTO THEIR KITCHEN so they can wash them with fabulous degreasing dish soap that gets them squeaky-clean, not to mention wonderful lotions to put on their dishpan hands afterwards..truly, I am a fortunate woman!

Many different issues to disentangle here:

In New Orleans, there has been an argument made (probably too late to save them) that in at least some of the projects, the problem was mismanagement rather than architecture (as, say, it was at the infamous Pruitt-Igoe in St. Louis or the Chicago high-rises) -- so they could theoretically be renovated rather than demolished. (I saw one article that renovation, to make them nicer than new, might even cost less than new construction.)

But at this stage of the process, the people of New Orleans need rebuilt housing as quickly as possible (2-1/2 years is sinful as it is), whether people like the lady pictured realize it or not.

(And I agree with those who say it's likely her nice things like the TV were rent-to-own, and thus sucking her even drier in the long run.)

Mrs. P.:

**Most of us were raised to understand that if we learned how to read, write, and cipher, got a job, got there on time every day, and were reasonably productive, we’d end up being self-sufficient and more or less secure, if not necessarily wealthy.**

WHAT WORLD ARE YOU LIVING IN?!?!

That's what they told me too, growing up. Bull-$#!+.

The American Dream is, if not dead, on life-support. ds wisely spoke about it from a blue-collar point of view. From a white-collar point of view, I have not just a bachelor's but a graduate degree, have won numerous professional awards -- and have gone through several downsizings and not had a permanent job in almost two years. (And I'm not 68 -- I'm 38.)

Work ethic? I'm repeatedly praised for my work ethic in the retail store where I'm working near my parents' house (where I'm living ...), and have been offered a job for as long as I need it after the holidays until I find a new one. So I don't think that's lacking.

I just need a break. But there seem to be very few in today's downsizing-obsessed (both white-collar and blue-collar) economy.

Eventually, I'm going to have to figure out a way to start my own business. But how do you do that when the larger economy has driven you down into (yes) poverty?

Richard:

On the issue of government taxing working people to support the shiftless and lazy ... one of the problems is that federal taxation, by definition, must be imposed uniformly across a country where there are incredibly different standards of living.

$100,000 for a family of four in Mississippi is upper-middle-class and about "thisclose" to being rich.

$100,000 for a family of four in New Jersey is barely -- and I mean BARELY -- middle class.

So I do understand the fear of higher taxes (especially in the urban Northeast), but given where I am economically right now IN NEW JERSEY, I wish there was more government support as well. (Not "the dole," job training and the like to reward effort.) So I may end up forced to move down to a Mississippi -- or at least North Carolina, where I have family -- to try to bridge some of the gap in my living standards geographically.

It would be VERY nice to know that the new digs will NOT be below sea-level...

Mrs. P.:

**Most of us were raised to understand that if we learned how to read, write, and cipher, got a job, got there on time every day, and were reasonably productive, we’d end up being self-sufficient and more or less secure, if not necessarily wealthy.**

WHAT WORLD ARE YOU LIVING IN?!?!

That's what they told me too, growing up. Bull-$#!+.

Well, I'm living in the world I live in, which is just as real as yours is.

I said that most of us were raised with those expectations, then you said that that's bull, and then you said that you were raised with those expectations, too. So if there's bull*!!* involved, it's that those expectations will be fulfilled, not that we have them.

Mrs. Pringle

I think the concept of "Deserving" and "Undeserving" is pretty much useless. Someone isn't undeserving because they make bad decisions about how to spend money. Foolish, yes. And I suspect the proposed demolition is being used as a scapegoat for the frustrations of these protestors. The protestors may be wrong, but the frustration is real.

Let's not forget what these New Orleans residents have gone through and are still going through.

"Did she buy the darn TV or not?"

It's already been decided she's a welfare queen, Max. Facts like the ones you want don't really matter anymore since she's already been judged and labeled.

By the same token, you can teach a chronically poor person a skill, settle them in a job and an apartment or room they can afford on their wages, and NOT be sure that in a year they won’t be back on public assistance. How do we change that? How do we ensure that THEIR children learn to be part of the system?

That is a complicated problem known as "structural poverty". The next era in politics- once the present one centered on social disputes ends- is probably defined by dealing with it, among other very large scale economic changes (diminishing of the war economy, huge shifts in energy sources, products and production, efficiencies, and social democratic institutions).

At the very bottom of the problem is chronic mental and physical disease. Then there are problems of sufficient and relevant education and predatory, counterproductive, destructive, and selfdestructive behaviors.

After that there are the things that underly the sustaining of working and middle class life: fair opportunity matched to education and ability, sufficient jobs that pay the level wages and benefits that sustain working or middle class material life, economic efficiencies such that wealth can in fact be built up, and some means of obtaining and building up of private capital on which middle class life is ultimately based.

That second part is initially a matter of continued technological change increasing productivity and wealth. With appropriate economic and political maturation, that is, to follow, as social barriers and politics diminish. There's no way to do it in the colonial and predatory type of economy we've had a resurgence of recently- that famously generates more and larger "underclasses", not less, and its proponents consider it a feature, not a bug.

The first part is messy and hard. As after ending slavery and all other great distortions in history, it will take several changes of generations for the trauma and full effects on beliefs and behaviors to come to the surface and erode away. The graveyards will do their part to end large scale disputes, unsustainable beliefs, and resentments, as ever. But as more and more young people can find their way out, social costs and programs (prisons, rehab, job training, the various subsidies) will fulfill their purposes and shrink.

The most fundamental element lacking is, ironically, technical- the sufficient biomedical research on the great problem hereditary diseases and disorders that drag people down out of ability to hold good jobs.

With enough information in hand we can diminish rates and severity quite rapidly. The immense declines in Huntington's Disease and Tay-Sachs Disease are modest and primitive, but pretty good, demonstrations of how to begin.

So, there's a lot to do. Once we decide to get to it. Once the important fact about poverty is actually poverty, not the spectacle of poor people behaving badly in a world in which, as Ambrose Bierce says, distance is the only thing they can get a lot of and keep.

My Grandmother had a saying: There are those that do for themselves and those that do for everyone else. The simple fact of the matter is : welfare is, and always has been: a bad idea.

Let me explain: Anyone and everyone is capable of doing something. (yes, there are exceptions.. coma, dead etc). No one deserves stuff for free. NO ONE. Not kids, not teens, not pregnant, not hurting, not old - NO ONE.

I am of the opinion that aid-programs should be reorganized so anyone receiving any form HAS to contribute something to the community. ANYTHING. Even kids can help pick up garbage at the park before they play. Elderly people can TEACH. There is always something that needs to be done and someone who needs a hand doing them.

Entitlement is B.S.

I have never been given anything, and I am a better person for it. Certainly better than if I had never had to realize the value of a dollar. As my very, very wise Grandmother said: The value of a dollar is not in what you can buy with it, but what you can accomplish with it. She was born of Cherokee/Dutch parents in Lincoln Nebraska in 1888, she was really "dirt poor" and yet, she had a clue, something the "victims" of New Orleans desperatly need to get.

While I slowly step down from my lonely podium let me get back on topic and say that inner city poverty has all kinds of fancy sociological definitions and industry based underpinnings, the reality is that it is a chronic mental disease born of generational government programs promoting never HAVING to provide for oneself. Once upon a time in the U.S. before the "Great Society" people moved to where the jobs were, and wouldn't put up with an area that couldn't support them. (Silly bastards acted just like Mexicans do now)

_____________________________________________
^^Bottom line and Merry Christmas

Garpin:

In blaming it all on the government, I'm going to reverse it and come at you from a Crunchy Con point of view.

As Robert Kiyosaki (not someone I normally agree with!) has pointed out, you have to be TAUGHT how to be an entrepreneur. If you aren't shown those skills by your parents even as a young child, you're not going to know how to make and save money. (Certainly in any amount the tax-cut wing of the Republican Party would respect.)

Let's see ... I'm the child of a family that, going all the way back to my grandparents, entirely consisted of military, civil service workers, and government contractors. I wonder why I never learned entrepreneurial skills ...

Yes, yes, I'm stuck now and better learn them on my own, because for sure no one's giving me any handouts, despite what you say! But it does explain, somewhat, why I've struggled in the workplace despite my education.

And it's a helluva lot more logical explanation for entrenched poverty like that in Nawlins even pre-Katrina than half the claptrap I've read on this thread.

A couple of months after Katrina, my family and I were in a local chain restaurant. Our server was a bright and positive young woman; I complimented her on her friendliness, given how crowded the restaurant was that day and how demanding some of the customers were being.

And that's when she told me that she was from Mississippi, from one of the small towns devastated by Katrina. (With all the focus on New Orleans, people forget how badly hit some of those other areas were.) A college student, she had no idea if or when she'd be able to complete her education; but she had nothing but sincere praise and gratitude for this corporate chain restaurant, who had turned her part-time local position into a full-time job in another state, and who was quietly helping many employees who were similarly situated after the devastation.

I'm sure she had dreams and ambitions that went far beyond that wait staff job, but for the moment she was working hard and very grateful for the help her employer had given to her.

What makes the difference? Age, education, family history, previous condition of independence, intact family structures?

To me, the sole factor that makes the difference between "deserving" and "undeserving" poor is the level to which the person or people are willing to participate in their own rise from poverty. We know that a welfare existence is a dead end, and however much we might sneer about "welfare queens" there's a devastating societal impact behind them, mainly in the form of children with no fathers raised to believe that they are "owed" everything: a home, education, a living, etc., from some nebulous entity called "the government" or people they don't know called "the rich." There's a world of difference between that attitude and the attitude of the woman I met, who was grateful for her chance to keep working and build up a new life for herself.

I, too, am angry that a poor negro has such a large TV.

The latest word from the Chicago Housing Authority is relevant to this discussion, I think. They are now requiring all able-bodied residents between 17 and 61 to be either working or going to school 20 hours a week. "Working" is defined as paid employment. So that, for instance, a 55-year-old woman living with her daughter and grandchildren can no longer provide full-time childcare for the grandkids, freeing her daughter to work and earn for the whole family. This is Phyllis Schlafly's worst nightmare. Presumably Grandma's best recourse is to set up an ad hoc childcare center for other women in the project, and I hope people are smart enough to catch on to this much-needed solution. But still, this is the end of the idea of the family as the realm of economic choice, in which people can distribute work and resources in accord with their own deepest values. Foo.

Garpin:

I don't necessarily disagree with your last post. As noted, I was raising Kiyosaki for discussion; I don't always agree with him!

Marian,

You are perhaps a bit too literal. I am grateful to GOD, my parents, and everyone else that has played a part in my life. I certainly didn't mean to suggest that I did everything on my own my entire life. I will re-iterate to clarify: Since such time in my life I was able to fend for myself in a manner that allowed me to take responsibility for my own actions; I have never received a single thing I did not work for in some manner or another, and by the grace of GOD, I am a better person for it. - How's that ? :)

Honestly, the point I was trying to make was simple: hard work and motivation will get you further than a hand-out. The best things in life are the things you cant buy and for me it looking back and taking pride in a job well done. But, I guess, that's me.

Merry Christmas.

For the record: My given name is NOT Garpin Blorp :)

Here's a quote from a book you should probably take a look at.
(fyi, it's in the chapter titled "Luke")

29And unto him that smiteth thee on the one cheek offer also the other; and him that taketh away thy cloak forbid not to take thy coat also.

30Give to every man that asketh of thee; and of him that taketh away thy goods ask them not again.

31And as ye would that men should do to you, do ye also to them likewise.

32For if ye love them which love you, what thank have ye? for sinners also love those that love them.

33And if ye do good to them which do good to you, what thank have ye? for sinners also do even the same.

34And if ye lend to them of whom ye hope to receive, what thank have ye? for sinners also lend to sinners, to receive as much again.

35But love ye your enemies, and do good, and lend, hoping for nothing again; and your reward shall be great, and ye shall be the children of the Highest: for he is kind unto the unthankful and to the evil.

36Be ye therefore merciful, as your Father also is merciful.

37Judge not, and ye shall not be judged: condemn not, and ye shall not be condemned: forgive, and ye shall be forgiven

I like what Geezer said. I want everyone to notice that in the Luke passage, it doesn't say "give only to the worthy" nor does it say "give as a loan and make them pay it back."

The good Samaritan that rescued the man left for dead on the roadside never considered whether or not the man deserved to be beaten or robbed. When he paid for the man's care, food, clothing and lodgings with a promise to pay more to the Innkeeper when he returned, he didn't tell the beaten man it was a loan to be repaid.

The concept of "undeserving poor" assumes that any human being can somehow be undeserving. Jesus felt and taught otherwise. Jesus never chose the people He healed or brought back to life based on whether or not they "deserved" His help or His healing. He never made anyone that He helped pay Him back either. Nor did He check up on them to see if they "sinned no more" if He forgave them. (Remember the fallen woman that people were going to stone? He never checked up on her to see if she actually went and "sinned no more.")

That we distinguish between "deserving" and "undeserving" poor is egregious in the extreme. They are HUMAN BEINGS, of COURSE they deserve our help! To segregate them is passing judgment on them and as you judge, so shall you in turn be judged. I would not wish to be judged and I will not judge between the poor. They are in NEED, we can and should help them. End of story.

To give us some context for Cruncy Con's original question,
maybe it would help to also define the "deserving" and "undeserving" rich.