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The Politically Incorrect Guide to Ending Poverty (2010)

theatlantic.com

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Re: The Politically Incorrect Guide to Ending Poverty (2010)

#61

Post by BurningFrog »

tomjen3 wrote: post #58
jkot wrote: post #8

> WHEN ROMER EXPLAINS charter cities, he likes to invoke Hong Kong. For much of the 20th century, Hong Kong’s economy left mainland China’s in the dust, proving that enlightened rules can make a world of difference. Charter cities are only possible because they concentrate capital, trade and workforce from mother country. It can not be done globally, entire China can not turn into Hong Kong

Except that to cross into Hong Kong from China you need a special permit: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frontier_Closed_Area So they couldn't concentrate the Chinese workforce, whereas there is nothing to prevent that concentration just on the other side of the border.

China has eased up a bit, but you still can't travel freely inside the country.

Re: The Politically Incorrect Guide to Ending Poverty (2010)

#62

Post by TheOtherHobbes »

douche wrote: post #19
adrianratnapala wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

China's government is far from perfect, but ever since Deng took over, it has been been implementing policies that resemble British Hong Kong more than they resemble Maoist China -- and it's working just fine. Life is not a zero-sum game. Rich places get rich not by stealing the cream, but rather by being less evil and stupid as other places.

Most things work better than Maoist China... Getting away from actively sabotaging your industrial and agricultural output with ideologically, rather than reality-based five year plans is a good start. Leaves a lot less dead bodies, too.

Someone should try this in the US.

Of course it's called "off-shoring" not "Maoism", but the effects on US industry have been very similar.

Re: The Politically Incorrect Guide to Ending Poverty (2010)

#63

Post by pcote »

poof131 wrote: post #45

Seems like we’ve entered some sort of post-modern neocolonialism. How do we “fix” the broken countries of the world. The neocons under Bush tried to remake the middle east by invading Iraq.[1] Debated with someone here who felt we just needed more time in Afghanistan so a generation could understand good governance.[2] In this article, the thrust seems to be benevolent foreign powers and businesses will lead the way…

>> Seems that SV and Stanford could do a lot more to fix the issues closer at hand in the Bay Area (homelessness, unaffordable living, rising inequality) and the US in general before solving all the worlds problems. Lead by example sort of stuff

Speaking as someone who currently struggles financially, one of those three things is not like the other....

Homelessness and unaffordable living are things that could potentially threaten me personally. Rising (income) inequality does not. There are bonuses and fat paychecks being received all the time by upper management in a casino nearby where I live. Those well-off managers are not the sort of things that are worth losing sleep over.

Re: The Politically Incorrect Guide to Ending Poverty (2010)

#64

Post by ChrisNorstrom »

1st Problem of this article: How do WE "over here" fix THEM "over there".

You cannot "fix" another group of people in another country. They have to fix themselves and go through the necessary procedures to stabilize, weed out problems and corruption, and change their culture, people, social mindset, and traditions. All the stable rich countries of today were once violence, corrupt, and environmentally dirty during their earlier years, suggesting a sort of "puberty period" that all nations go through.

One group cannot build a country, achievements, stability for another group. If they try it is almost always only a temporary success, followed by complete failure as soon as the original "building" group pulls out. Google "the white foreigner effect" http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0167268115... the most horrifying side effect is that natives purposely handicap themselves to signal need to an outside charity. This leads to dependency.

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/25/world/africa/mosquito-nets...

http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB123758895999200083

In the short term good is done and hearts are warmed but in the long term a nation doesn't develop an immunity to its problems. A charter city would be no different. People would become dependent on the charity, funds, resources, and achievement coming out of the foreign created character city. What incentive do they have to create their own city? If they tried how could they compete with the foreign city?

2nd Problem: The solution and problem in the article is based on an emotional desire to uplift another group of people. Don't you think they want to lift themselves up? Do you believe they want you to lift them up?

What the article suggests, which is basically "nation creation communism" will actually do more damage to a country than good. Because now the native original people of a country cannot compete with the success, wealth, and power of the "colonizers" who are trying to uplift them out of poverty. This is the same series of ideas that sound good and make you feel good but actually cause damage. Countries grow and mature and stabilize on their own at their own natural rate. Trying to artificially "fix" each country ahead of its time, I believe, is immoral. That's like giving your kid steroids because you want them to hurry up and grow faster.

Re: The Politically Incorrect Guide to Ending Poverty (2010)

#65

Post by harlanlewis »

pcote wrote: post #63
poof131 wrote: post #45

Seems like we’ve entered some sort of post-modern neocolonialism. How do we “fix” the broken countries of the world. The neocons under Bush tried to remake the middle east by invading Iraq.[1] Debated with someone here who felt we just needed more time in Afghanistan so a generation could understand good governance.[2] In this article, the thrust seems to be benevolent foreign powers and businesses will lead the way…

>> Seems that SV and Stanford could do a lot more to fix the issues closer at hand in the Bay Area (homelessness, unaffordable living, rising inequality) and the US in general before solving all the worlds problems. Lead by example sort of stuff Speaking as someone who currently struggles financially, one of those three things is not like the other.... Homelessness and unaffordable living are things that could potent…

Hope that things work out for you. Definitely agreed there's a difference in immediate existential threat between those categories, but concentration of wealth isn't wholly unrelated. Some would argue it's a cause.

Re: The Politically Incorrect Guide to Ending Poverty (2010)

#66

Post by yummyfajitas »

CPLX wrote: post #50
yummyfajitas wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What do you think will go wrong? Please be concrete. If such cities suck worse than the alternatives, no one will move to them. The real worry I think many have is that charter cities will be successful and will demonstrate (by being successful without it) that a lot of existing socially favored regulation is harmful.

This already went wrong. We are commenting on an older article. He actually got a chance to try this project and it failed pretty resoundingly. I eagerly await your "no true Scotsman" response.

No, he didn't. Honduras cancelled the project.

Re: The Politically Incorrect Guide to Ending Poverty (2010)

#67

Post by yummyfajitas »

andrepd wrote: post #47
yummyfajitas wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What do you think will go wrong? Please be concrete. If such cities suck worse than the alternatives, no one will move to them. The real worry I think many have is that charter cities will be successful and will demonstrate (by being successful without it) that a lot of existing socially favored regulation is harmful.

That thinking works in a perfect world with perfect information, 100% rational agents, and frictionless movement. It doesn't work for impoverished, illiterate, uneducated people with the weight of poverty, culture and a myriad of other practical considerations from food to roads to family preventing them from take the 100% rational actions that you expect them to take. The problem with you libertarians is that everyt…

Ok. How does it fail in reality? Please be specific.

Re: The Politically Incorrect Guide to Ending Poverty (2010)

#68

Post by evanpw »

andrepd wrote: post #47
yummyfajitas wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What do you think will go wrong? Please be concrete. If such cities suck worse than the alternatives, no one will move to them. The real worry I think many have is that charter cities will be successful and will demonstrate (by being successful without it) that a lot of existing socially favored regulation is harmful.

That thinking works in a perfect world with perfect information, 100% rational agents, and frictionless movement. It doesn't work for impoverished, illiterate, uneducated people with the weight of poverty, culture and a myriad of other practical considerations from food to roads to family preventing them from take the 100% rational actions that you expect them to take. The problem with you libertarians is that everyt…

This is very similar to an argument that libertarians make about their opponents. As long as the government is made up of benevolent geniuses with perfect information about every individual citizen, then socialism is a great idea. In reality, individual preferences are unknowable, and government workers are fallible and have motivations of their own.

In reality, neither utopia is particularly achievable in the world as it currently is, but that doesn't mean that incremental steps in one direction or the other can't improve the situation.

Re: The Politically Incorrect Guide to Ending Poverty (2010)

#69

Post by auganov »

poof131 wrote: post #45

Seems like we’ve entered some sort of post-modern neocolonialism. How do we “fix” the broken countries of the world. The neocons under Bush tried to remake the middle east by invading Iraq.[1] Debated with someone here who felt we just needed more time in Afghanistan so a generation could understand good governance.[2] In this article, the thrust seems to be benevolent foreign powers and businesses will lead the way…

I'm expecting a resurgence in colonialist-like approaches. Especially in the context of the Middle East. It's exactly failures like Afghanistan and Iraq that make some consider solutions involving total governance for much more than just a few years. A case can be made for the US having been morally obliged to basically colonize Iraq (and Afghanistan tho I'm less familiar with that one).

Re: The Politically Incorrect Guide to Ending Poverty (2010)

#70

Post by safeignorance »

evanpw wrote: post #68
andrepd wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That thinking works in a perfect world with perfect information, 100% rational agents, and frictionless movement. It doesn't work for impoverished, illiterate, uneducated people with the weight of poverty, culture and a myriad of other practical considerations from food to roads to family preventing them from take the 100% rational actions that you expect them to take. The problem with you libertarians is that everyt…

This is very similar to an argument that libertarians make about their opponents. As long as the government is made up of benevolent geniuses with perfect information about every individual citizen, then socialism is a great idea. In reality, individual preferences are unknowable, and government workers are fallible and have motivations of their own. In reality, neither utopia is particularly achievable in the world…

I'd guess very few of libertarianism's opponents believe in socialist utopias, and what the article suggests is about as far from an incremental step and one can possibly get...
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