In the March 2020 Ensign, Sharon Eubank, first counsellor in the Relief Society General presidency, wrote an article called “And the Lord Called His People Zion”. There was one particular quote I wanted to highlight that I think embodies general attitudes among the LDS membership towards the poor:
Trillions of dollars have been expended by governments and organizations in the last century to eradicate poverty. Yet for all of the well-intentioned work, a great deal of it has been unsuccessful and wasted. Why? Because it inadvertently created dependency instead of ability.
You see, Eubank, like many members of the church see poverty as a personal failing. They buy into the capitalist myth that the only thing you need to get out of poverty is to work hard.
To them, poverty isn’t structural. They don’t see that poverty exists because the system is designed for it to exist. It is impossible in capitalism—where the means of production is privately owned by a relatively small group of people—for there to be rich people without their being poor people.
Rich people become rich because they take money from the poor. Property owners charge renters more than the rental unit is worth, then pocket the difference. Business owners pay employees less than what they charge customers, then pocket the difference. And so on.
And every time the rich take money from the poor, it hinders the social mobility of the poor. Every $100 in profit the landlord makes each month is $100 each month the renter can’t save, can’t invest, can’t use to get out of debt. Every 20% markup the business owner charges on the retail price of the product their employees create is 20% less in wages the employees see every month, 20% they can’t save. can’t invest, can’t use to get out of debt.
On the idea that the reason why anti-poverty programmes of governments and nonprofits over the last 100 years hasn’t worked, Eubank is wrong. It’s not because we’ve created dependency. It’s because every programme has been a bandaid solution, none of which address the actual cause of poverty: the rich.
Ironically, Eubank quotes a scripture in her article that touches on this very solution: D&C 104:14–16.
I, the Lord, stretched out the heavens, and built the earth, my very handiwork; and all things therein are mine. And it is my purpose to provide for my saints, for all things are mine. But it must needs be done in mine own way; and behold this is the way that I, the Lord, have decreed to provide for my saints, that the poor shall be exalted, in that the rich are made low.
Right there at the end. The poor will only be exalted when the rich are made low. If you truly want a zion people, where all have everything in common (4 Ne. 1:3, Acts 4:32), we must do away with the rich. The law of consecration, the eradication of poverty, even Zion itself will never be achieved as long as wealthy inequality exists.
Zion will never occur under capitalism. Jesus said so.
