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MIT economist believes U.S. is shifting to be more similar to developing nations

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Re: MIT economist believes U.S. is shifting to be more similar to developing nations

#181

Post by nandemo »

CuriouslyC wrote: post #28
nirav72 wrote: post #6

I'm thinking MIT economists haven't lived in a third world. (I was born in one) The U.S is not even remotely close to being a third-world or will be one anytime soon.

I've seen places in Mississippi, Arkansas and West Virginia that looked every bit as third world as rural Philippines/Vietnam. What the US lacks is urban poverty in the form of shantytowns. This is because unlike most third world nations, we quickly raze them when and find excuses to incarcerate the people who live there. If we were more permissive, we'd certainly have them too.

That's such BS. Have you actually lived in a developing country?

If you're American and you care about poverty -- as in relative poverty -- in your country and you want to do something about it, more power to you. It's not like someone being much poorer elsewhere prevents you from caring about a problem in your country. But please don't trivialize abject poverty by implying that the American working class have it as hard as the lower classes in the developing world.

It doesn't matter what some parts of the US anecdotally and subjectively "look like", they don't measure nowhere near as poor as rural Philippines or Vietnam. Or urban Philippines/Vietnam for that matter.

In those countries, the literacy rate is around 95%. Imagine 5% of people around you are illiterate. Even in Brazil, a so-called "emergent" country or "upper-middle income" country, the literacy rate is only 92%. So 8% are illiterate; not "functionally illiterate" as in unable to correctly interpret certain texts, mind you, but actually unable to read. You cannot get a fast-food job or work as a Walmart greeter if you're illiterate! In contrast, in developed countries the literacy rate is >99%.

In the Philippines, 1 in 3 children are malnourished.[0] This isn't some vaguely defined "food insecurity" concept; it's actually malnourishment, kids being severely underweight and stunted.

In the US millions of people can take advantage of welfare benefits. So even the non-working poor in the US have much, much better living standards than the working poor in the developing world. Also, when exactly did the US bulldoze a shantytown? And so on.

[0] http://www.rappler.com/move-ph/issues/hunger/141134-philippi...

Re: MIT economist believes U.S. is shifting to be more similar to developing nations

#182

Post by partisan »

abalashov wrote: post #59
nunez wrote: post #4

While I don't think the US is, de jure, a third-world country, I completely believe that it is, de facto, for many. I am on my way back from Memphis and onto Detroit, and both of these cities and their home states have plenty of areas that look unbelievably impoverished. Based on what I've seen from my years of traveling the country, it would not surprise me if most of the country had this problem. It's really sad.

I am not sure how a country becomes a Third World country _de jure_. Does it apply for membership in the Third World, sign a treaty to join the coterie of developing economies? Does the Supreme Court rule in a landmark case brought to it to finally settle the country's global status? Could this be a case of "I don't think that word means what you think it means"? :-)

Can we be a little more charitable and stick to the topic?

De jure "Third World", would mean that the country is either poor, or developing, possibly industrialized[2], and rightfully such[1].

[1] https://www.google.com/search?q=de+jure&oq=de+jure

de jure - denoting something or someone that is rightfully such.

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_World

"Because many Third World countries were extremely poor, and non-industrialized, it became a stereotype to refer to poor countries as "third world countries", yet the "Third World" term is also often taken to include newly industrialized countries like Brazil, India and China now more commonly referred to as part of BRIC."

"Over the past few decades since the fall of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War, the term Third World has been used interchangeably with the least developed countries, the Global South, and developing countries, but the concept itself has become outdated in recent years as it no longer represents the current political or economic state of the world."

Re: MIT economist believes U.S. is shifting to be more similar to developing nations

#184

Post by wastedhours »

phkahler wrote: post #19
kristofferR wrote: post #2

Am I wrong in attributing/connecting most of Americas problems with its flawed constitution/democratic system? The first version of something is rarely the best version, and while the US constitution contained a lot of fantastic elements and freedoms that every educated American knows about, it also contained a democratic system (first past the post/two party system) that is mathematically bound to breed divisiveness…

I think most of the division in US politics comes from the way representatives are influenced. By co-locating them all in Washington we enable destructive lobbying while keeping them away from the people they are supposed to represent. The party system is also destructive - I advocate against any legal recognition of political parties and against campaign ads funded by anyone outside the state a person is running in.…

The current US party system might be destructive, but am a believer in party politics - mainly because without it, to get anything done would take the form of voting blocs which can lead down the path to more backroom "scratch my back" deals.

Re: MIT economist believes U.S. is shifting to be more similar to developing nations

#185

Post by naasking »

ethbro wrote: post #177
naasking wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Which do you want more: non-partisan cooperation or absolute-transparency? Except you can have both as long as you ensure factual standards for news reporting.

You can only have both as long as you have a dispassionate electorate driven by logic and willing to research issues with the aid of a well-funded and independent press. Given that I don't think we've ever had those conditions... lesser transparency for more cooperation seems a decent bargain.

Like I said, mandate factual reporting standards and the news agencies will do the research for the people. That's their purpose after all.

Studies have shown that moderate positions need evangelists just as much as extreme positions, as people tend to cluster around the positions with evangelists. Mandating factual standards ensures evangelists at least have justifiable reasons for their positions.

Re: MIT economist believes U.S. is shifting to be more similar to developing nations

#186

Post by phkahler »

ptaipale wrote: post #65
phkahler wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wow, that's really lame. It's like dividing middle school into the "cool kids" the "delinquents" and everyone else. If you're not part of a faction though you're a "third world" loner.

Cold war wasn't such a lame thing. As a third-worlder (Finland), I'm quite happy that the US was there to help with the "cool kids".

I just meant the characterization was lame. How do you like Finland being a 3rd world country given the negative connotations that have since been assigned to the term? You may just say "that doesn't fit" like I did when I learned that Finland is a 3rd world country.

Re: MIT economist believes U.S. is shifting to be more similar to developing nations

#187

Post by Doe22 »

ab5tract wrote: post #160
danieltillett wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a bit of a hobby horse of mine, but the reason is the number of elected representatives has not kept pace with the population growth. When the USA was founded there were about 20,000 electors per representatives and now in some seats there are over a million. If you want representation you need to be able to meet and talk to your rep - more importantly they need to be able to acquire your vote without the nee…

I agree fully! Apparently they stopped adding representatives when they filled up the space in the capital building. I've been intending for ages to pull up the ratio mandated by the constitution to see how many "missing" representatives we have today.

It looks like Article 1 Section 2 has what you're looking for, specifically "The Number of Representatives shall not exceed one for every thirty Thousand, but each State shall have at Least one Representative" [1]

Wikipedia also seems to provide a good summary of the issue. [2]

[1] https://www.archives.gov/founding-docs/constitution-transcri...

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_congressional_ap...

Re: MIT economist believes U.S. is shifting to be more similar to developing nations

#188

Post by naasking »

alistairSH wrote: post #152
naasking wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Which do you want more: non-partisan cooperation or absolute-transparency? Except you can have both as long as you ensure factual standards for news reporting.

Can you? With the American primary election system, legislators are driven to cater to their most extreme constituents. With transparency, they can't work across the aisle AND also win a primary. At least with pork barrel, they get a tangible thing to point to while campaigning to attempt to appease constituents.

Legislators are driven by extreme positions because of the perception that these positions represent enough voter sentiment to influence elections. In fact most constituents are more centrist, which factual reporting standards would highlight.

Re: MIT economist believes U.S. is shifting to be more similar to developing nations

#189

Post by Balgair »

accountyaccount wrote: post #179
dcdanko wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You mean like the States?

Sure, but there's no regional intermediary. Government scales from city, to county, to state... then straight to federal.

Not always true. SF is both a city and a county, for example. Also, different states do it differently. Colorado has many cities that span county lines. Yes, going across the street in the same city means you now are under different laws. This isn't all that different than, say, a school district and it's tax base. We do also have regional systems, like the Mississippi/Colorado river watershed districts that help manage and maintain water usage in those areas. These inter-state issues have been cropping up for a long time (Bleeding Kansas, for an extreme example) and we mostly manage them pretty well and pretty silently. Turns out, the constitution actually does work alright.

Re: MIT economist believes U.S. is shifting to be more similar to developing nations

#190

Post by spir »

nandemo wrote: post #181
CuriouslyC wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've seen places in Mississippi, Arkansas and West Virginia that looked every bit as third world as rural Philippines/Vietnam. What the US lacks is urban poverty in the form of shantytowns. This is because unlike most third world nations, we quickly raze them when and find excuses to incarcerate the people who live there. If we were more permissive, we'd certainly have them too.

That's such BS. Have you actually lived in a developing country? If you're American and you care about poverty -- as in relative poverty -- in your country and you want to do something about it, more power to you. It's not like someone being much poorer elsewhere prevents you from caring about a problem in your country. But please don't trivialize abject poverty by implying that the American working class have it as…

This econtalk episode featured an interesting comparison between US rural poverty and 3rd world countries. http://www.econtalk.org/archives/2016/10/chris_arnade_on.htm...
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