Gandhi isn't merely calling for charity or guilt-driven sacrifice—he's identifying a mathematical reality about finite resources and planetary limits that we still struggle to accept. The phrase pivots on that word "simply": the rich trading complexity for simplicity (fewer possessions, less consumption) so the poor can access simplicity's opposite meaning (the basic dignity of shelter, food, health). When billionaires install private space programs while workers in their own countries skip meals, we see this principle inverted—the privileged choosing elaborateness while the vulnerable remain deprived. What makes this radical is that Gandhi absolves the poor of any obligation to improve themselves first; he places the burden squarely on those with surplus, suggesting that justice sometimes requires the comfortable to become uncomfortable.