The origin of evil

In these past weeks, an unusual phenomenon has occurred in Mexico City: many elderly people are committing suicide. This happens at the same time that a process obstructed by bureaucracy is leaving thousands of elderly people without the pension the State had been giving them for several years.

We could view this problem superficially, blaming the banks that complicate the renewal of cards, or the government officials who treat the elderly impatiently and shout at them for not knowing how to activate their cards at an automatic teller machine, or the lack of information on how to carry out the entire process.

When state resources are used to help people in a time of need, it is always a positive thing, since it allows for alleviating problems and enables citizens to regain the stability necessary in order to overcome whatever has happened. In this context, we can mention assistance for reconstruction after natural disasters, social disorder, economic crises or wars.

Some of these cases can be normalized as long as certain rules are added that prevent their permanence. For example, the unemployed can be supported with a temporary pension, tax forgiveness or in-kind aid, but rules must be put in place so that, after a certain period, the individual makes the necessary changes to obtain a new job, whether by seeking new employment or rethinking to take on new opportunities.

The danger arises when the aid becomes permanent, since it becomes part of the individual’s life and can come to mean a vital element in their existence. This is dangerous because, no matter how much one may wish, an assistance program cannot be permanent, and its abrupt end can mean the ruin of those who depend on such aid.

What happened in Mexico was that at the beginning of the 20th century, a pension program was initiated so that workers could have access to a pension in their old age. The program was not applied to 100% and many workers could not enjoy these pensions, especially those in informal jobs; to this we add acts of corruption that stole money from pensions and the implementation of new emerging programs that only worsened the problem.

At this moment there are several millions of elderly people in Mexico who do not receive a pension, and obvious solutions did not happen or only partially occurred. For example, the plans for reintegration of the elderly into the labor force only worked for a couple of years, after which they were forgotten and only a job bank for elderly people who wish to return to work remained; the lost capital from the pensions was not recovered nor was any plan drawn up to refinance them, instead a process was initiated that completely eliminates the pensions; the transportation, medical assistance, or housing programs worked for a couple of years and then disappeared without a trace.

This leaves millions of people in misery, for which local governments implemented emergency programs based on the distribution of pensions and food baskets. However, they applied these emergency plans without addressing the root of the problem, and as the aid was extended, people began to depend on it to survive.

This month many of the cards distributed in Mexico City have expired, the elderly go to the bank to request their pension and cannot receive it since they must go through a renewal process that includes going to a government office, a bank branch, and activating their new card at an automatic teller machine. For many of them, understanding these procedures or having to interact with a computer in order to receive this pension is impossible.

Many of these pensioners do not have any other type of income, do not have relatives or friends who can help them, and, since they completely depend on this aid, they fall into despair because their lives depend on that money.

These people, in my opinion, did not have to die and, above all, did not have to be in this situation. We could have helped as a society to reform our laws and do things right so that no one would have to be in such a situation, but instead we only gave them a little money and a hat from a political party.