Just out of curiosity how much practical,"hands-on" experience do you have with various regions of the world? I have seen,up close and personal,poverty of several shapes and sizes.That includes "Latin" poverty.Not Spanish,mind you,Portuguese.I've seen slums ("favelas") of Rio and Sao Paulo into which the Brazilian *Army* dares not enter *during daylight hours*.Let me know what *you've* seen...what *you've* experienced.
Your offensive statement was with respect to the learning of a language per se. It remains a dumb and offensive statement.
I was challenging the usefulness of learning a *particular* language,one language.Learning Japanese? Not a bad idea.German....Dutch....French...Mandarin...Cantonese,ditto.Spanish? Great,maybe you can get a gig on Sabado Gigante or as a translator in a hospital ER.
Your use of statistics is also totally misleading and the comparisons are silly and naïve. Spain’s GDP per person is higher than New Zealand’s
Over the last 30 years Spain has enjoyed a *huge* inflow of EU cash courtesy of the taxpayers of Germany,Britain,the Netherlands,Ireland,Sweden and Finland.New Zealand has no such sugar daddy to whom she can turn.
..and about the same as Israel.
Israel being a nation that's been on a war footing since the day it was founded.Spain hasn't been on a war footing since the 1930's.
To sum up,let's engage in a grand challenge.You move to Mexico,or Spain,become fluent in Spanish.I'll move to Germany and learn German.Let's see who benefits more...financially...in our efforts.And no fair working for a company whose world headquarters is located in an English speaking country.
I also have done work in Brazil and Argentina. Their slums are astounding in their size and are frightening - but then so are the slums Bronx, East St Louis, New Orleans, Detroit, DC and the Southside. I have also worked in Spain, Italy, Germany, Austria, Belgium, France, Norway and Switzerland.
Your contempt for Spanish-speakers and learners is still illogical and racist.
By the way and so there is no misunderstanding, I am for English as the official US language and for a real English language requirement for citizenship.