top of page
  • Instagram
  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • YouTube

If God exists, why doesn't he take care of poverty?

We understand God has the powers to do anything. Then why doesn't He fix the problem of poverty?



Thomas Malthus was an English economist whose ideas influenced policymakers and thinkers worldwide, right up to the 20th century. He predicted that population growth would far outstrip food production, leading to starvation and other dreadful outcomes. The world's population has grown almost eight-fold since Malthus's time (1 billion in the late 18th century) to nearly 8 billion now, but we have not yet run out of food. We are growing - and wasting - more food than we need, and there is no danger of running out of food, even if the population increases further. You can attribute this to the bounty of nature and God or advances in agricultural technology.


But that does not mean that there haven't been famines and mass starvation deaths in the two centuries following Malthus's dire predictions. This is a list of a few famines of the past two centuries.


  • 1850-1873 (China). Because of the Taiping Rebellion. 60 million dead.

  • 1896 - 1900 (India). Because of British policies. 2 million dead.

  • 1917 - 1919 (Iran). 2 - 10 million dead.

  • 1921 (Russia) 5 million dead.

  • 1928 - 1930 (China) 3 - 10 million dead.

  • 1932 - 1933 (Soviet Union) 7 million dead.

  • 1943 (India). Bengal famine. 2 million dead.

  • 1959 - 1961 (China). Great Chinese famine. 15 - 55 million dead.