Poverty and the Third World - How can we rectify it?

[G.W.K]

Hello,

Just watched a programme discussing poverty and the Third world. I can't see why it is such a big problem...it is something that can be easily fixed. The governments always say how they want Africa and other deprived areas to become wealthy and independent but don't do much to help.

There are so many ways to help. For example: why don't we just make money and give it to them? It is as if the government want to see these poor people suffer! I find it quite sad. Does anyone else agree that we and/or the government should do more to help?

Just wondering,

G.W.K

[prongated]

There are so many ways to help. For example: why don't we just make money and give it to them?

It's a very complicated issue and the problem isn't simply about generating money...

Obviously the first issue is how to distribute the money. Many of these governments are corrupt and high-rank officials end up pocketing the money themselves. Even if the money does go to the people, it is only a short-term solution. Sure, transactions increase in the short-run, thus stimulating the economy.

However, what is going to guarantee this continuity in the long-run? If not enough of these spendings are directed towards infrastructure investment, it will impede further growth in the economy. When the economy stagnates again, are you going to give money to these people again? Obviously, ideally you want to the initial money injection to kick-start the flailing economy so that it can run on its own toes.

In the above scenario, we haven't even talked about the possible shortage of supply of goods due to the sudden boost of money supply. Static supply and a sudden burst in demand growth will push prices up. So with all that extra cash, you'll end up with the same amount of goods anyway.

What this highlights is the fact that not only are these countries short of money - they are also poor because they lack resources and materials to begin with!

It is as if the government want to see these poor people suffer! I find it quite sad. Does anyone else agree that we and/or the government should do more to help?

There is a branch of economics called Development Economics that attempt to formulate the best response to this issue. They are slowly achieving results in certain countries such as India - although it is interesting to note that the majority of such economists today are of Indian/Sri-Lankan background (e.g. Amartya Sen).

So anyway, to help such countries, you can't hand out money to the public just like that. A Keynesian solution would be to get the government to build infrastructure. This will provide employment to the people of such countries, attract investors into the country etc. so it will be economically beneficial in the long-run.

Institutionalist economists will probably look at the current state of population welfare (especially nutrition and health) and will argue for the creation of government-funded health and education institutions in order to improve human resource qualities. Nutrition itself is actually a sub-subject of Development Economics research. Same with education.

Among the most interesting is the finding that in India, for every extra year of education a mother has, her child will be taller by half a centimetre (from what I remember). The argument is, literate mothers are able to access information written in newspapers etc. and are more equipped to deal with diseases common in very unhygienic environments e.g. diarrhoea. Just the fact they know to get their children drink lots of water can help form fitter human beings in the country in the future.

...what I want to highlight there is, the issue is very complicated and is a subject of much research. Something should indeed be done to help these people, and I think it is being done, albeit very slowly - or the impacts are seeping through very slowly, depending on what/who you believe. In the above scenario, we haven't even mentioned government corruption, coordination failures, agriculture/modern sector...

[term]

The governments always say how they want Africa and other deprived areas to become wealthy and independent but don't do much to help.

That's the point. Besides all the complicted issues involved, if they wanted it they could to it.

for obvious reasons they don't want it: a) It costs much money b) Our wealth is based on their poverty, with other words wealth is not created just like that, but distributed in the first place. If they become richer, we lose money and power.

Two very good arguments for letting people suffer. But hey, how can you know you're rich if there's nobody else who is poor?

[G.W.K]

If they become richer, we lose money and power.
Two very good arguments for letting people suffer. But hey, how can you know you're rich if there's nobody else who is poor?

Yes but they could at least give money to help them with food, shelter, medicine...the essentials. Not leave them there to die!

G.W.K

[gyzzzmo]

Yes but they could at least give money to help them with food, shelter, medicine...the essentials. Not leave them there to die!

G.W.K

What i will say is probably going to shock you :p
But letting those people die might not even be that bad. Giving them food and medication is a bad thing to do to my opinion. Their current agriculture/culture cant sustain the amount of mouths to feed. Feeding them and giving them medication will only increase the population and make the problem worse. Instead we should focus on spreading agriculture techniques, so they can learn to get a good food flow (and how to decently spread food).

[thalbergmad]

I completely agree with the last post.

Thal

[ramithediv]

Now that the people in these countries are living longer and their children are all living longer still, why are they still having so many children. 

Why have children if you can't feed them. 

The catholic church stops a lot of them using any kind of contraception, which also spreads AIDS. 

Yet another so called "Good Deed" the church is doing to help. 

I don't think the church can be part of the solution. 

Sorry about the religious thing, but I think it is very much on topic. 

[G.W.K]

Now that the people in these countries are living longer and their children are all living longer still, why are they still having so many children.
Why have children if you can't feed them.
The catholic church stops a lot of them using any kind of contraception, which also spreads AIDS.

A good point. Why do they have so many children if they can't properly look after them?

G.W.K

[gyzzzmo]

Its not that they poop out loads of kids because they think they can look after the kids. They start pooping kids because in countries like that, more kids means better future for the parents since the kids take care for their parents once they get old.

[G.W.K]

But most parents in Africa die before their children have became independant and the children end up ill as well because they don't have the medicine to help them as well as their parents.

In other words...poverty eventually can cause death.

G.W.K

[prometheus]

The African people need to do this themselves completely. We can't do it for them. That will always fail.


Main thing we need to do is to stop preventing them from ending poverty.

Then, we can support THEIR efforts to build up their community/economy.


Most third world help is contra productive.

[thalbergmad]

Most third world help is contra productive.

Yes, i am with you on that one.

Thal

[prongated]

But letting those people die might not even be that bad. Giving them food and medication is a bad thing to do to my opinion. Their current agriculture/culture cant sustain the amount of mouths to feed. Feeding them and giving them medication will only increase the population and make the problem worse.

On the contrary. Why do you think they have so many children? It is because they have high infant mortality rate. They need these children to grow up and in the future provide for the family as well - including the parents. As a result, they need this high birth rate to ensure there are children who survive.

If you improve food supply and medication to these people, infant mortality rate will be reduced and these families will not need to have so many births. Moreover, improved food supply and medication will mean healthier children, translating to higher-quality labourers in the future that are able to work more and generate more income for the family.

The long-term effect is great! 3 problems:

1. In the short-run, families may not realise this and thus continue to reproduce at the high rate. Because mortality rate is reduced and birth rate remains the same, you will end up with a blowup on population. If, however, the aid continues, families will eventually realise this correction and birth rate will reduce gradually as well.

2. It's hard to institutionalise such aid - especially since corruption is rife in these governments. Moreover, if you are to give them medication, what do you think they'll do with it? Use it, or sell it? The reason why most drug companies and the Western world are reluctant to provide such aid is because of the fact many of these drugs will enter the black market. You won't save many lives, and you are damaging your own economy.

3. Another is associated with education/work tradeoff as a result of this aid.

So anyway...

Most third world help is contra productive.

Disagree. Aids are very helpful. They just need to be instated properly to make them effective and away from government corruption.

[prometheus]

No. Most aid is by western organizations and run by westerners. Yes, they have all the good intentions, mostly. But the west benefits more from aid than Africa itself, for example.

Often you can almost call it neo-colonialism.

Just remove the trade boundaries and all the other stuff we have set up to keep the poor poor and then help finance the projects the people themselves start up.


Now development aid is basically a way we pay off our guild for the regulations we have set up to keep the third world poor.


I generally agree with this guy:

[gyzzzmo]

Also, most corruption in those countries is caused by major western industries who bribe people to get their factories working there, they even give them weapons to hold of people who dont agree with all that money flowing directly to western countries.

If we really want a healthy africa, we should pull out all western companies, their money and the weapons, build a giant gate around africa and let those people handle their own problems. Only thing we could do is spread agricultural techniques and help them spread food. But i gues that will never happen 

gyzzzmo

[G.W.K]

OK. Time to put this at a different angle:

Imagine it was you. You and all the other people you knew. Your country. How would you feel at being left to die and suffer? You would want help wouldn't you? Imagine all the people you cared for having to die in pain. Die with AIDS or some other disease. You wouldn't want to be left there dying of diseases and starvation. Most of these people don't even have fresh drinking water!

Isn't this a breach of their human rights? They are allowed life as much as we are!

G.W.K

[prometheus]

I am not saying they shouldn't be helped. The point is they aren't being helped right now.

We spend 2.3 trillion dollars, measured in today's dollars, on aid in Africa. It had zero effect. Zero economic growth and zero increase in living standards.
And then Bono starts talking about doubling the COSTS of aid to Africa.


Our 'aid' is shoved down their throats. No one cares about what the poor actually want or what they think about the aid they received. No one cares about what effect, if any, it actually has.


The poor are not the 'customers' here. It's the people with the guilt, the people that spend the money, that are the customers. It's about what they want.

[gyzzzmo]

gwk: If i would live in that country, i would want the best for my country. And western influence seems nice on short-term, but longterm it makes it worse. Its funny you bring up AIDS. If we wouldnt have been there, aids would have killed itself. But because we made transport so easy, the 'virus' can spread and by giving them medication we give the virus even more chance to spread lol. Btw, they 'die in pain' because we are stretching that pain instead of just letting them die.
Pain is only relative btw, if those people didnt know better (that there is medication), they would just have accepted it and there would be alot less 'pain'.

About drinking water... if the people died as they should have, there wouldnt be a shortage problem as it is now.

[prometheus]

Uuh gwk, people in Africa are also humans.

[prongated]

Just remove the trade boundaries and all the other stuff we have set up to keep the poor poor and then help finance the projects the people themselves start up.

That's essentially what I'm saying! Did I use the term 'aid' too loosely? I think other forms of aids are very crucial in improving human resources in the long-run, but otherwise I agree with what you say. And a very interesting clip there ^^

If we really want a healthy africa, we should pull out all western companies, their money and the weapons, build a giant gate around africa and let those people handle their own problems. Only thing we could do is spread agricultural techniques and help them spread food.

Indeed, if food is your only measure of well-being ^^ I think it can be done without closing down trade. Besides, at least theoretically, these western companies do help provide employment for the locals...

Our 'aid' is shoved down their throats. No one cares about what the poor actually want or what they think about the aid they received. No one cares about what effect, if any, it actually has.

Or as said before, whether the aid actually does reach the intended recipient...

Regarding the effect, I see it as more of a long-term thing. It takes a long time to build up someone's physical well-being after such a long time of deprivation. And the effort needs to be coordinated. Nutrition, sanitation, medical access, even sewage and waste system and more need looking into - no good just fixing up one thing without the others.

So I indeed agree that the problem isn't so much about the amount of aid. It's about how these money are distributed!

About drinking water... if the people died as they should have, there wouldnt be a shortage problem as it is now.

...what shortage? Please fill me in if I miss something, but as far as I'm aware the problem isn't so much the amount as it is the geograhical distribution and the quality of existing water...and in any case it's a problem that one can rectify by building the appropriate infrastructure etc.

[G.W.K]

Uuh gwk, people in Africa are also humans.

Exactly! And they have the same rights that all other humans have.

G.W.K

[prongated]

Exactly! And they have the same rights that all other humans have.

G.W.K

...doesn't match up with...

if the people died as they should have...

...?

[ilikepie]

...doesn't match up with...

...?

...doesn't match up with...
Quote from: gyzzzmo on Today at 10:28:29 AM
if the people died as they should have...
...?

Perhaps they are 2 different people with different opinions?

[ramithediv]

Bloody Christmas again soon

[prongated]

Perhaps they are 2 different people with different opinions?

Oh dear...

...I really need to go to bed...zzzzz...sorry GOD!

zzzzz...

[prometheus]

There's more than two people?

[gilad]

Since South Africa moved over to democracy 13 years ago, poverty has more then doubled here!!!!!!!!

I'm not anti democracy or anything, but with "freedom" has come oppressive circumstances. We've lost all the best entrepeuners to foreign countries on account of aweful crime and constant power cuts, strict labour regulation etc etc.

for each of those people that close the business and leave the country perhaps 100 people find themselves out of the job. It is similar to what happened with white owned farms in Zimbabwe, and thus the country is experiencing a devastating derth of drops and food.

I could not believe my ears when i heard that the number of people here since 1996 living on under one US dollar a day has more than doubled

GO the ANC!!!!! You're doing a fantastic job on righting this country.

we're on our way to becoming akin to Zimbabwe.

There is no logic behind the poverty in Africa.

It is due to apathy, selfish leadership, corruption and a contempt for any sort of western ideas about developement that leave Africa in particular in such a mess.

All of the above is arguable. I am just in a bad move and thus have chosen to vent. But I am sure South Africa is going to be a wrecked country in 15 years time.

[soliloquy]

let them all get AIDS and die.  Then they're not poor any more, they're dead


Plus, helps with the overpopulation thing!

[gilad]

soliloquy. The government here is doing pretty much that.

[G.W.K]

let them all get AIDS and die.  Then they're not poor any more, they're dead

Plus, helps with the overpopulation thing!

Oh...I can tell you are such a sweet, caring person.

G.W.K

[thalbergmad]

But I am sure South Africa is going to be a wrecked country in 15 years time.

One of my best friends is South African and they have said the same to me, albeit they don't think it will take that long.

I have never understood why Mandella was and is hailed as some kind of saviour and hero.

It appears to be a Country out of control.

Thal

[mephisto]

I have never understood why Mandella was and is hailed as some kind of saviour and hero.


Thal

IMO he is the best living person I am aware of.

[ronde_des_sylphes]

I have never understood why Mandella was and is hailed as some kind of saviour and hero.

Thal

I wouldn't claim to be an expert on South Africa, but my understanding of it was that the problem was Thabo Mbeki.

[jakev2.0]

Our wealth is based on their poverty, with other words wealth is not created just like that, but distributed in the first place. If they become richer, we lose money and power.

This is the absolute opposite of reality.  Who would you rather have as a trading partner: A country that can supply what you want to buy, and buy what you want to sell, or a country that is too poor to do either?  Free trade has positive net benefits.  The notion of trade as a zero sum game was debunked over two centuries ago. 

Two very good arguments for letting people suffer. But hey, how can you know you're rich if there's nobody else who is poor?

This is pretty absurd and nihilistic.

The reason that poor countries are poor is because they are ruined by corruption, lack of political freedom, and the absence of functioning economic markets. This is why simply giving money to poor governments does little other than to allow corrupt thugs to buy the Rolexes they always wanted. 

The best way to alleviate world poverty is to spread political and economic freedom. As prongated said, there are branches of economics with these goals in mind.

[prometheus]

Because of their power western companies can make sure they can force unfair deals upon African people.

If African people want tomato or chicken it's cheaper to buy European overproduction than to buy it from their neighbor?

How can an African farmer compete with that?

[term]

This is the absolute opposite of reality. 

Not really.
Enough money goes into these countries to get raw material out of them. Corporations invest enough to keep the needed infrastructure.
What we produce goes to us and anybody else who has the money to buy it. Since there are some, but not so many, a high consumption mentality is forced upon people to get more money out of less people, which i think is undeniably true.
You can't have both, wealth and cheap resources. *That* is unrealistic.
The foundation of wealth is and always was suffering of others, period. History shows you, and the political and social status quo shows you, simply by the presence of industrialised countries. It's like in a society, but globalised: the upper 15% and the rest, 85%. (roughly).

The reason that poor countries are poor is because they are ruined by corruption, lack of political freedom, and the absence of functioning economic markets.

Which is there not because third world countries don't have the knowledge and resources to maintain a wealthy society, and not because they're all currupt from the day they're born, but because they are forced into that position. Or what is your opinion on why these countries are affected by these problems, but we are not? We had and still have the same corrupt assholes, bad leaders....
Very generally said: There are differences in success, mentality and wealth of nations, but besides these differences there is no natural reason (in the narrow sense) for such a huge amount of countries in the world to live at such a low standard.

Again: What is true for societies is true for the whole world, there is a small percentage of rich countries, a middle class, and some very poor countries. The principle remains the same, there is a classical class struggle going on because that's human reality and always was.

I probably sound like "the world is evil, consumption and rich people are the root of all problems" and so on, but that's really not how i mean it. I just neutrally state how i think it is and it's my belief that it is this divergency which keeps humanity going and creates history.

[prometheus]

The last one is correct in some cases. But that's because we destroy their markets.

[G.W.K]

Plus, helps with the overpopulation thing!

It isn't just the Africans that have made this world overpopulated...it's everyone. A more simple way to stop overpopulation without letting everyone die with AIDS...is to do what China does. Limit the children...one per family.

Once enough people die throughout the world of natural causes, etc...we won't be overpopulated.

G.W.K

[gyzzzmo]

It isn't just the Africans that have made this world overpopulated...it's everyone. A more simple way to stop overpopulation without letting everyone die with AIDS...is to do what China does. Limit the children...one per family.

Once enough people die throughout the world of natural causes, etc...we won't be overpopulated.

G.W.K

Well its obvious the china way doesnt help... Also our economy doesnt support and old population and we need that economy for research (for cleaner energy, planetary expension etc.).

[G.W.K]

Well its obvious the china way doesnt help...

That's because you need the rest of the planet to do it too! One country isn't going to solve overpopulation!

G.W.K

[kony]

apparently this one-child policy has prevented 250 million births. that's pretty good, don't y'all think.

[G.W.K]

apparently this one-child policy has prevented 250 million births. that's pretty good, don't y'all think.

I do not know...anyone got an opinion?

G.W.K

[gilad]

Apparently there are to many youn men in China and they can't find wives.

They abort female fetuses or something. So all the poor guys are desperate and dateless. A serious problem modifying nature.