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Bill Gates says poverty is decreasing. He couldn’t be more wrong

theguardian.com

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Re: Bill Gates says poverty is decreasing. He couldn’t be more wrong

#51

Post by macspoofing »

CamTin wrote: post #23
tossaccount123 wrote: post #8

100 years ago the richest man in the world could die from a simple infection because there were no such thing as antibiotics. People take for granted so many things we have in the modern world, they want some form of utopia right now. Perfect is the enemy of good

And now the poorest man in the world will die from the same infection because he can't afford the antibiotics, or has no access to a doctor who can prescribe them to him. What's the difference between something existing but being impossibly expensive vs not existing at all, except for the ultra rich?

>What's the difference between something existing but being impossibly expensive vs not existing at all, except for the ultra rich?

Are you arguing that access to healthcare for the global poor isn't the best it has ever been and hasn't been getting better every year? Because we know that's the case.

Re: Bill Gates says poverty is decreasing. He couldn’t be more wrong

#52

Post by bryanlarsen »

Note that the author uses absolute numbers rather than relative numbers, nor does he give the value of the increase. Hint: the increase is measured in millions rather than billions.

The relative numbers are 71.8% in 1990 vs 58.1% in 2013

https://www.jasonhickel.org/blog/2018/8/30/the-moral-egregio...

Re: Bill Gates says poverty is decreasing. He couldn’t be more wrong

#53

Post by seibelj »

tdrgabi wrote: post #2

This sounds like fantasy to me: "Prior to colonisation, most people lived in subsistence economies where they enjoyed access to abundant commons – land, water, forests, livestock and robust systems of sharing and reciprocity. They had little if any money, but then they didn’t need it in order to live well – so it makes little sense to claim that they were poor." They still fought over resources and hunting grounds. T…

Maybe a hunter-gatherer society that never found conflict could fit this stereotype, if they ever existed. But the moment people put down roots, others wanted their stuff.

The Aztecs were destroyed as a result of colonization, but Cortes couldn’t have killed them without getting a coalition of enemies of Montezuma on his side. And the reason a coalition could happen was that the Aztecs were merciless in their enslavement, taxation, and domination of other tribes and cities in their region.

Colonizers did horrible things but let’s not pretend that humanity was pristine and without malice before the Europeans arrived. Human nature does not change.

Re: Bill Gates says poverty is decreasing. He couldn’t be more wrong

#55

Post by neolefty »

b_tterc_p wrote: post #40
CamTin wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And now the poorest man in the world will die from the same infection because he can't afford the antibiotics, or has no access to a doctor who can prescribe them to him. What's the difference between something existing but being impossibly expensive vs not existing at all, except for the ultra rich?

When you say ultra rich, you really mean not third world country poor.

One thing that Factfulness does is take a more nuanced look at wealth. Rosling makes 4 categories of prosperity — the majority of which by population are in the middle, neither ultra-rich nor ultra-poor.

Something he wrote that helped me understand: From the point of view of the wealthiest societies, everyone else looks poor. But there's a huge difference — in quality of life — between subsistence-poor and bike-to-the-market poor. In the second category, your children are probably going to finish high school and have a chance at professional careers. In the first category you're one injury or bad harvest away from disaster.

Re: Bill Gates says poverty is decreasing. He couldn’t be more wrong

#56

Post by hannasanarion »

avmich wrote: post #42
hannasanarion wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It absolutely is. If you are sick and dying, you're probably not taking any income. We should expect poverty to be directly corellated with health, and the data agrees. Poke around on gapminder and see for yourself.

> If you are sick and dying, you're probably not taking any income. It's easier for me to imagine sick person doing some work for himself or his family than sick person doing many kinds of work for others in monetary economy. If you have society with little use of money, I think relationship between health and poverty is different than in modern capitalism.

What makes you think that day laboring in a field is any easier to do while sick than driving or serving or knowledge work?

How you are paid for your work is irrelevant when you are too sick to do it.

Also, why are we treating money like a colonial invention?

Re: Bill Gates says poverty is decreasing. He couldn’t be more wrong

#57

Post by neolefty »

maw wrote: post #38

I'm still waiting to find someone who uses the word neoliberal as a slur and who hasn't benefited enormously from it. It could be a while.

Or even accidentally turns it into a username. Honestly, it wasn't political when I picked it.

Re: Bill Gates says poverty is decreasing. He couldn’t be more wrong

#58

Post by bogle »

cryoshon wrote: post #13

the perspective that i think is missing from the article is that a lot of the drop in extreme poverty isn't the result of organized work by the world to curb misery. it's a result of the chinese economic boom which created the world's biggest middle class while also nearly erasing extreme poverty in the world's biggest country. a lot of the numbers we see regarding "world poverty" are misleading because of how impres…

> the perspective that i think is missing from the article is that a lot of the drop in extreme poverty isn't the result of organized work by the world to curb misery

He did indeed make that point by calling out the flatlining in poverty reduction if you removed China from the data.

Re: Bill Gates says poverty is decreasing. He couldn’t be more wrong

#59

Post by sct202 »

watwut wrote: post #46
sct202 wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah my parents are from one of those formerly poverty stricken places, and there was money, trade, and land ownership. So many people who are living today have experienced their lives improving rapidly within their memory, that it seems ridiculous to claim the opposite.

Your parents are from "prior to colonization"? That is unlikely. Regardless of original claim of before colonization, your parents might see end of it.

I'm sure that the 40 years of European colonization 400 years ago most definitely taught my barbaric ancestors how to use silver and claim land.

Re: Bill Gates says poverty is decreasing. He couldn’t be more wrong

#60

Post by bogle »

mrits wrote: post #54

My first reaction was that such irresponsible writing shouldn't be allowed here. But it's a good reminder how an expert with a narrative to fit is much worse than someone misinformed with good intentions.

The data in the graphic was misleading. Given the data corrected for China from 1981 it shows a flat line. I'm sure that is a useful takeaway, even if the politics isn't to your tastes.
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