Extreme Poverty: It's Very, Very Bad

Years ago, Matt Miller introduced me to the concept of "Still True Today" -- the basic point being that a lot of the most important facts in the world rarely get reported because they don't constitute "news." The blogosphere, unfortunately, really hasn't done much to ameliorate this. I could, for example, write a post every single day about how hundreds of millions of people around the world are living in absolutely deplorable conditions and we ave the power to substantially ameliorate that. But I don't, because there's no peg.

This morning, though, I'm attending a ONE Campaign panel on just this, so I do have the opportunity. I don't have any real expertise or analysis to offer on the subject of aid per se, but from a blogging/activist point of view, I'll simply say that this is a topic where a quite broad range of elites are eager to see US policies changed -- it's a very bipartisan group. What's lacking is evidence of a mass constituency that particularly cares, which, I guess, is where the idea of netroots outreach comes in. At any rate, this is probably the most important issue there is.

Comments

Yes, it is. The shitholes of today are the terrorist breeding grounds of tomorrow. People in Africa know we have medicine that would help them live longer, that would prevent them transmitting aids to their children, or that would go a long way towards eradicating several parasites and other pathogens that make their lives hell. They know that, and they know that we care too much about money to help them. We care too much about keeping them weak so they can never challenge us in any way.

Don't think for a moment that it doesn't matter, or that we won't deserve everything we get as a result. We could have done something, but we didn't want too. It's not that it would have been too hard, or that we'd have even suffered any noticeable dip in our standard of living. It's just that, as a society, we don't believe in helping people. We believe that if you're poorly off, you deserve to be so ha ha ha. Ultimately, every person in a democracy is to blame for the decisions of their government. That's what democracy is about.

Posted by soullite | August 4, 2007 10:33 AM

We need to develop clear ideas of what we could have done- and why we were stupid not to have done it.

For example, the $60 billion spent on Star Wars could have developed solar power. Our forces in Iraq could be running most of their equipment on solar power instead of diesel gensets, except, of course, we wouldn't be in Iraq!

Instead, our generals focused on defeating the V2s that Hitler fired at England. But this time our generals aren't even ready to win the last war. We were better prepared at Pearl Harbor- at least then our carriers were at sea.

So this is just one example, and, seriously, get steamed up a bit and dwell on some of this stuff in your mind, and come up with good comments or soundbites to use when you get the chance.

Another example- if the Green Zone is ever completed and staffed, the Peace Corps won't be there. WTF?!?! Iraq doesn't qualify for some peaceful assistance?

if we can't turn these priorities around, we're going to be in some deep doo doo.

Posted by serial catowner | August 4, 2007 10:34 AM

And Generalissimo Francisco Franco is still dead.

Posted by Glenn | August 4, 2007 10:53 AM

serial catowner,
Have you ever checked out the Cunning Realist? He has a blog post the other day about what a frickin' boondogle the Green Zone has become. Baghadad has barely any running water or electricity and yet the Green Zone is like living at Larry Ellison's estate(not to pick on poor Larry, but the pictures will make you think you are at some rich mans estate). One other thing. For the Decider and all his phony religious assholes, they sure don't read the bible. There is a passage in it where Jesus says to the effect, "That which you do to the least of my brothers, that which you do unto me." Think about that for a minute.

Posted by Joe Klein's conscience | August 4, 2007 11:06 AM

Hey Matt you are a blogger, not a Professor. Write about things that interest you. Don't worry if you are not an expert.

If we needed expertise, we can always read Ken Pollack and his buddy O'Hanlon etc.

Posted by gregor | August 4, 2007 11:12 AM

Hey Matt you are a blogger, not a Professor. Write about things that interest you. Don't worry if you are not an expert.

If we needed expertise, we can always read Ken Pollack and his buddy O'Hanlon etc.

Posted by gregor | August 4, 2007 11:13 AM

Quality, for-profit news is an oxymoron, at least in the US. The news media in this country will never focus on what is most important in the world but on what will sell, because making money is their raison d'etre. And that means insuffienct coverage of events and conditions outside our borders and serious, intractable problems like poverty and hunger, coverage of which is neither entertaining nor new but only depressing.

Posted by synic | August 4, 2007 11:30 AM

At any rate, this is probably the most important issue there is.

That's goddamn right.

Posted by Neil the Ethical Werewolf | August 4, 2007 12:53 PM

Yay, Matt! This vibrant, brilliant inner goodness of yours is why your commenters don't hate you completely. Plus, you're good to have on hand if a knife fight breaks out.

Posted by ferd | August 4, 2007 1:23 PM

Like Robert Lucas said about economic growth, "the consequences for human welfare involved in questions like these are simply staggering: Once one starts to think about them, it is hard to think about anything else."

Have you read "The Bottom Billion" by Paul Collier? I'd like to see you blog about that...

Posted by ed | August 4, 2007 3:08 PM

Matt, as far as India goes, the three most effective uses of development dollar in alleviating poverty are

1. Primary education.
2. Roads (connecting the village to the larger market).
3. Investment in improving agricultural productivity.

The problem is that US aid typically goes to to mega-projects, from which some is diverted to corrupt officials' pockets. Secondly, US aid has typically been soft loans, and that increases the indebtedness of the country.

I would rather that the US invest in making sure that the world agricultural market is fair to third world farmers than in providing aid.

Posted by Arun | August 4, 2007 3:14 PM

Send all your money to a shithole if you want, but don't make me send mine. Forty years of doing that and most of Africa is worse off than it was before. How about we let them solve their own problems? A lot of aid is misguided and makes things worse.

Also, you keep repeating the lie about poverty causing terrorism. You keep forgetting that the 9/11 terrorists weren't poor, Osama's not poor, the physician-terrorists in Britain weren't motivated by poverty, etc. Most Arab countries aren't poor compared to the "shitholes" you speak of, and truly poor shitholes like Haiti aren't known for exporting terrorism.

Posted by Fred | August 4, 2007 3:16 PM

Yes, it is. The shitholes of today are the terrorist breeding grounds of tomorrow.

That is a faulty paradigm the Left keeps clinging to. The terrorist leadership tends to be full of university grads in the 60 or so Islamic groups active today. About half the "tip of the spear" operatives of radical Islam, the actual lethal agents, come from middle class to prosperous homes of the business, professional, and land-owning classes - mainly in Saudi Arabia, Yemen, The Levant. Reporters who went to interview families of terrorists, expecting squalor, were sometimes shocked to arrive at a mansion where the father and siblings all had graduate degrees.

The other half of "tip of the spear" operatives, were poor or working poor radicalized in madrassahs paid for by well-off Muslim zealots with plenty of disposable income. Similarly, the scouts, logisticians, financiers, recruiters, ID, intelligence and cyberwar people of radical Islam arrayed to support "tip of the spear" actions against infidels circling the globe from Latin America to East Timor tend to be well--off, degreed individuals.

It's just that, as a society, we don't believe in helping people. We believe that if you're poorly off, you deserve to be so ha ha ha.

Not true, again. Another dumb Lefty meme not reality-tested. While we could do more in certain areas, like remove export barriers to African and Latin goods that would not damage us and our industries 1/1000th as much as the whores to business are doing with Open Borders to China:

A. The giving level of Americans and Canadians in foreign aid is actually is better than just a few Scandanavian nations when private charity, not just government largess is included. The stingiest assholes are Russia, China, some Latin nations, and the wealthy Arab nations that send nothing past their borders in aid except funds for spreading their religious cancer. The Saudis were infamous in the 2004 Tsunami for offering 50 million in aid, and all that for Wahabbi centers and Mullah's pay.

The USA also did incredible good work in several other key areas:

B. The USA-led Green Revolution tripled food staples production in temperate to subtropical regions, affectively ending famine except in African areas where dysfunctional societies, climate change, and dramatic overbreeding ensures the dummies will keep on starving.

C. America ensures freedom of the seas, keeps global watch over pirates, deters any nation that opposes free passage of goods by air or ship. Spends enormous money doing so. That ensures resources can go where urgently needed, for the most part.

D. Centers the admittedly flawed, but still massively important Wold Back, Inport Export Bank. Funds nearly 40% of UN activities.

The problems with poverty these days are mainly:

1. Overbreeding. The world had 1.5 billion people in 1900. It has 7 billion now, with excess population far exceeding the jobs local economies can provide, self-sufficiency. One reason KSA is so restive is the standard of living has declined dramatically as population quadrupled and jobs and oil revenue very adequate for 1960 KSA now have to be split by 4. Western aid, in the end, cannot defeat Malthus's simple math. Borlug and other technology won a respite, but unless 3rd worlders start following China, Malthus's grim effects will stop global population from quintupling again to 35 billion.
Nor can the West continue to accept a flood of "poor desperate refugees" as an alternative. If the world heads towards 20 billion and 18 billion of those wish to move to a great life in the West - how many, if any in meaningful numbers - get the pass to resettle and raise plenty, and plenty of kids??

2. Societies not overpopulated but destitute anyways, like Mayanmar or the Congo, are that way from a dysfunctional societal system, corruption, failed education system, and failure of rule of law.

Posted by Chris Ford | August 4, 2007 8:30 PM

Poverty cannot be eradicated, for its definition is not static, but evolves with progress.

Posted by gregor | August 4, 2007 8:42 PM

"Poverty cannot be eradicated, for its definition is not static, but evolves with progress."

Right. So when the "poor" Africans start agitating for BMW's with better sound systems then we can call the whole war on poverty thing over. However, while children continue to die of malnutrition by the millions, let's just operate on the assumption that there remains something left for us to do.

Posted by Gordon Lightfoot | August 4, 2007 8:53 PM