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Like it or not, people prefer wealth with a risk of cancer to rural poverty. If they didn't, they would remain in their remote rural villages instead of flockin

Like it or not, people prefer wealth with a risk of cancer to rural poverty. If they didn't, they would remain in their remote rural villages instead of flocking into the highly polluted factory areas. Delhi is another example of this (it's 3x worse than Beijing right now). I hate the place; this month it was so polluted that I couldn't see across my office complex. But if you use violence to force the Biharis to stay home (i.e., give up free trade) you'll have a riot on your hands. Yeah, free trade is in fact better than dire poverty, which is the alternative.

crdoconnor 11y ago
>Like it or not, people prefer wealth with a risk of cancer to rural poverty "Since Guan-yin's husband died of stomach cancer two years earlier, she's been pushing for change. She says she's been harassed by authorities constantly" How does it feel being an apologist for some of the worst forms of state oppression?
digikata 11y ago
You're assuming people have perfect foresight into their risks moving to such an area - they don't. Your also ignoring that sometimes the pollution moves to where people already live. The reasonable choice is to work towards advancing standards for everyone worldwide. Sometimes the advances will come organically delivered by free markets, and sometimes they'll have to be regulatory (closing down externalities ignored/un-priced by markets). The choice certainly isn't free trade or dire poverty in the long run.
- yummyfajitas 11y ago
  Anyone with eyes has a pretty good idea that they are walking into a toxic soup. I left Delhi on the 22nd - this picture is pretty accurate: http://i.huffpost.com/gen/2343988/images/o-DELHI-AIR-POLLUTION-facebook.jpg http://i.huffpost.com/gen/2343988/images/o-DELHI-AIR-POLLUTI... Or, back in July (before things got bad) I could do maybe 10 suicide sprints in NY. Then I flew into Delhi and was down to 4 - breathing was just that hard. I know there are lots of jokes about Biharis, but they aren't as stupid as you are making them out to be. They move to Delhi with good but imperfect information about both the pollution and the economic opportunity. I'm all in favor of pollution taxes and internalizing externalities. I'm just saying that even in spite of that, the economic gains seem to drastically outweigh the health penalties as evidenced by millions of people moving towards the pollution.

crdoconnor 11y ago

>Like it or not, people prefer wealth with a risk of cancer to rural poverty "Since Guan-yin's husband died of stomach cancer two years earlier, she's been pushing for change. She says she's been harassed by authorities constantly" How does it feel being an apologist for some of the worst forms of state oppression?

digikata 11y ago

You're assuming people have perfect foresight into their risks moving to such an area - they don't. Your also ignoring that sometimes the pollution moves to where people already live. The reasonable choice is to work towards advancing standards for everyone worldwide. Sometimes the advances will come organically delivered by free markets, and sometimes they'll have to be regulatory (closing down externalities ignored/un-priced by markets). The choice certainly isn't free trade or dire poverty in the long run.

yummyfajitas 11y ago
Anyone with eyes has a pretty good idea that they are walking into a toxic soup. I left Delhi on the 22nd - this picture is pretty accurate: http://i.huffpost.com/gen/2343988/images/o-DELHI-AIR-POLLUTION-facebook.jpg http://i.huffpost.com/gen/2343988/images/o-DELHI-AIR-POLLUTI... Or, back in July (before things got bad) I could do maybe 10 suicide sprints in NY. Then I flew into Delhi and was down to 4 - breathing was just that hard. I know there are lots of jokes about Biharis, but they aren't as stupid as you are making them out to be. They move to Delhi with good but imperfect information about both the pollution and the economic opportunity. I'm all in favor of pollution taxes and internalizing externalities. I'm just saying that even in spite of that, the economic gains seem to drastically outweigh the health penalties as evidenced by millions of people moving towards the pollution.