About ten years ago we had a man by the name of George Bloom attending our church, and he loved to write poetry and prose. He gave me the following entitled ‘Do We Have it Rough’:

If the five billion people in the world were reduced down to a single town of 1,000 people, these statistics would be seen:

a) 20 of the people would be from the USA, 980 from the rest of the world.

b) The 20 Americans would receive half the income, the rest of the town would have to get by on the other half.

c) 303 of the people would be white, 697 non-whites.

d) The 20 Americans would have an average life expectancy of over 70 years, the non-Americans an average under 40 years of age.

e) The 20 Americans would consume 15% of the town’s food supply, even though they make up only 2% of the people, and the lowest income group of the Americans would be better off than the average of the remaining non-Americans.

f) The Americans would use 12 times as much electricity, 22 times as much coal, 21 times as much oil, 50 times as much steel, and 50 times as much equipment as the rest of the people in town.

Still think you’ve got it rough?

Tags: missions, statistics