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I live in Ecuador (South America). Our land is packed with high-quality oil, virtually unlimited food and impressive biodiversity (google "yasuni").
Although our country looks perfect, 15% of us live in extreme poverty (this means living out of less than 2 bucks a day). The other 60% is mid-low class with less than $1000 of annual income.
The only explanation I have is that our presidents had not been doing their homework. Corruption, organized crime, economic crime, you name it.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Especially when there are a variety of similar countries in the vicinity with a variety of governments but with similar levels of poverty.
Gabon is nearby and is relatively wealthy.
No, really, the author is saying nothing. Wealth is just one part of a society. Effective government is another part. They are both effects of other causes. And they themselves feed back. It's not hard to point out the essentially gangster-like attributes of almost any government. The USA seizes its citizens' property and kills people all across the world. Oddly, since it steals so much more from a wealthier population, the theft isn't as painful. It requires infrastructure to efficiently transfer taxes up and back down to government parasites, rather than have the parasites take it by hand, as in Cameroon. So people rarely think of the USA as a gangster demanding protection money.
This guy is just another reductionist sociologist trying to come up with that one...one...one...reason why an extremely complicated situation is perpetually botched.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Gabon is nearby and is relatively wealthy.
Gabon:Cameroon::Oman:Yemen. Oil. No, really, the author is saying nothing. Wealth is just one part of a society. Effective government is another part. They are both effects of other causes. And they themselves feed back. It's not hard to point out the essentially gangster-like attributes of almost any government. The USA seizes its citizens' property and kills people all across the world. Oddly, since it steals so mu…
He didn't strike me that way (I read the whole book, not just this chapter on Cameroon). Granted, the answer to "why are countries poor?" can never be one thing.
I think his point wasn't so much that the government was stealing but that the government created a system that reduced people's incentives to be productive.
http://www.amazon.com/Europe-Underdeveloped-Africa-Walter-Ro...
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Gabon is nearby and is relatively wealthy.
Gabon:Cameroon::Oman:Yemen. Oil. No, really, the author is saying nothing. Wealth is just one part of a society. Effective government is another part. They are both effects of other causes. And they themselves feed back. It's not hard to point out the essentially gangster-like attributes of almost any government. The USA seizes its citizens' property and kills people all across the world. Oddly, since it steals so mu…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Gabon:Cameroon::Oman:Yemen. Oil. No, really, the author is saying nothing. Wealth is just one part of a society. Effective government is another part. They are both effects of other causes. And they themselves feed back. It's not hard to point out the essentially gangster-like attributes of almost any government. The USA seizes its citizens' property and kills people all across the world. Oddly, since it steals so mu…
I don't think it's that complicated. And I think that various reasons might explain portions of the problem. For example, maybe this reason explains 70% of the problem. We can use science, mathematics, and statistics to test hypothesis about this, and journalism to publicize the results of our tests, as this guy and the people he cites have done. But I don't think calling someone a reductionist sociologist without pr…
Good point. So who is this guy? His name is Tim Harford, and according to the book jacket of The Undercover Economist:
"Tim Harford writes the Financial Times Magazine "Dear Economist" column, in which he draws upon the latest economic theories to provide tongue-in-cheek answers to readers' personal dilemmas. He also works at the World Bank, where he is the lead writer for the Chief Economist of the International Finance Corporation. Formerly an economics editorial writer at the Financial Times, Harford has served as both an economist for a major oil company and an economics tutor at Oxford University. He lives in Washington DC."
So I think it's fair to call him an economist and a writer.
So the reason that poor countries are poor is Corruption
The article is actually quite interesting in that it examines the motives a dictator has to foster stability and financial growth (so that there is more to plunder). But to achieve this growth the dictator needs help from the army or the police (any group of men with guns will do) and that comes in the form of letting them indulge in their own corruption. This leads to a national death spiral as the only way to get support for your corruptive endeavors is to let your subordinates pillage their subordinates. It is a toxic trifecta of mistrust/corruption/lack of institutions which leaves the country entirely dysfunctional.
It's a fascinating article. You should read it.