This is particularly relevant because it appears Romer will be the chief economist at the World Bank soon: http://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2016/07/it-... [edit for a better link]
The Politically Incorrect Guide to Ending Poverty (2010)
21–30 of 107 posts
Re: The Politically Incorrect Guide to Ending Poverty (2010)
#22Assuming this ever worked, and produced good results, what happens when ten or fifteen years later, the corrupt local dictator takes over, all of the administrators flee before the mobs take their lives or nationalize all of their property, and all of the expertise and institutions that kept things going evaporate. Because we have a lot of examples of that happening.
Its a good point. To put it another way, Romer focusses heavily on the system of rules in place, and that is no doubt import in attracting migrants and capital investment, but what about defense? Nobody is going to want to build factories, ports, and the like, unless they are well defended. The reason Hong Kong worked well wasn't merely the system of rules, it was also the presence and backing of the British military…
It also helps that Hong Kong was essentially founded as a drug smuggling entrepot, which generated truly obscene amounts of profit.
Re: The Politically Incorrect Guide to Ending Poverty (2010)
#23Earlier quoted context omitted.
Thank you. I just couldn't force myself to read through articles that are so padded with fluff.
What you're describing as "fluff", most people describe as "long-form writing." If you're reading purely for brrt-brrt-clank-insert-information-into-meatbot-head, you're missing out.
Different learning styles and purposes. Even people I know who enjoy descriptive detailed writing when reading a novel like to-the-point list of facts/arguments when reading news and essays.
Re: The Politically Incorrect Guide to Ending Poverty (2010)
#24Shorter version: Create corporatist deregulated cities in corrupt third world countries and assume that rather than enriching multinationals via lax oversight the project will make poor people less poor. Hard to see what could go wrong with that plan.
thanks for the summary!
Re: The Politically Incorrect Guide to Ending Poverty (2010)
#25Assuming this ever worked, and produced good results, what happens when ten or fifteen years later, the corrupt local dictator takes over, all of the administrators flee before the mobs take their lives or nationalize all of their property, and all of the expertise and institutions that kept things going evaporate. Because we have a lot of examples of that happening.
Its a good point. To put it another way, Romer focusses heavily on the system of rules in place, and that is no doubt import in attracting migrants and capital investment, but what about defense? Nobody is going to want to build factories, ports, and the like, unless they are well defended. The reason Hong Kong worked well wasn't merely the system of rules, it was also the presence and backing of the British military…
Maybe the solution is to locate them in countries that are sufficiently weak militarily that they cannot take over the charter cities easily. A lot of places currently meet that criterion.
Medieval cities had walls which were generally enough to keep the feudal overlords out. They were individually quite weak militarily. In Italy at least they succumbed quickly to foreign powers like France after 1494. It's probably bigger outside powers you want to worry about.
Re: The Politically Incorrect Guide to Ending Poverty (2010)
#26This American Life & Planet Money did a follow-up on this idea three years later: http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/483/s... Against the odds, Honduras was actually willing to give the "charter city" model a go, but the project turned into a disaster before it even got started. Mostly because Paul Romer is an egotistical, antisocial control freak and nobody could work with him. There's a lesson h…
I remember hearing that podcast and feel the same way. I find it excruciatingly frustrating to hear about smart people who fail to realize when they are undertaking something about which they might seek advice. For instance, did Romer ever even just google "how to persuade people in developing countries" or "working within government bureaucracies"? Doesn't seem like it.
Re: The Politically Incorrect Guide to Ending Poverty (2010)
#27Shorter version: Create corporatist deregulated cities in corrupt third world countries and assume that rather than enriching multinationals via lax oversight the project will make poor people less poor. Hard to see what could go wrong with that plan.
Why third world? We have tons of ailing dying rust belt and Midwestern cities.
Welcome to the St. Louis Free Economic Zone.
My politics are weird though. I would combine it with a basic income and single payer health care. I think the best current system we could create would be a strong but non invasive social safety net combined with total at will employment and business deregulation.
Re: The Politically Incorrect Guide to Ending Poverty (2010)
#28Earlier quoted context omitted.
Thank you. I just couldn't force myself to read through articles that are so padded with fluff.
What you're describing as "fluff", most people describe as "long-form writing." If you're reading purely for brrt-brrt-clank-insert-information-into-meatbot-head, you're missing out.
Others might also describe it as "getting paid by the word count".
Re: The Politically Incorrect Guide to Ending Poverty (2010)
#29Shorter version: Create corporatist deregulated cities in corrupt third world countries and assume that rather than enriching multinationals via lax oversight the project will make poor people less poor. Hard to see what could go wrong with that plan.
Well, it sort of works: massively increasing the wealth of any third world country will shift it from "if you're poor then you starve and die" to "if you're poor then you are begging on the street and sometimes working a lousy job for little money". It's not much of an aspiration, but it is, strictly speaking, an improvement. It's also not a hypothetical: supply-side economic demonstrably works, to some extent. It ju…
Two counter examples to your first statement about positive benefits of massive increases in wealth: Nigeria and Venezuela.
Re: The Politically Incorrect Guide to Ending Poverty (2010)
#30Earlier quoted context omitted.
Thank you. I just couldn't force myself to read through articles that are so padded with fluff.
What you're describing as "fluff", most people describe as "long-form writing." If you're reading purely for brrt-brrt-clank-insert-information-into-meatbot-head, you're missing out.
bullshit.
If someone would write an article that long without offtopic infos that would be cool.
most of this text is just fluff to stretch out the whole thing without adding anything...