COMMENT | It’s not the first time the poor are blamed for being poor.

This old school thinking started in the 1970s and 1980s. The idea is simple: You are poor because you are either too lazy, too irresponsible, too immoral, or all at once.

Prime Minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad reaffirmed this at the monthly civil servant gathering at Putrajaya. He said that the reason for poverty was because the poor are “unproductive” and they “do not contribute to society in a way where society would repay them”.

This was similar to the thesis he first developed 50 years ago, that says poverty is created due to the lack of industriousness and their shortage of business acumen...