4 ms·

That puts the problem in perspective. This is a solvable problem. I'm a fan of solvable problems and people who solve them.

Shivetya 10y ago
It is solvable in simplistic terms. It is not solvable by throwing money at it. It just an dumb attempt to guilt people and further this constant bemoaning there are some super rich people in our world. Most people are poor because of their government. Either through corruption, lack of property rights, or wars both internal and external. We cannot fix poverty in this world until people are guaranteed freedom and safety of person and their property.
- marmot777 10y ago
  How do you define simplistic terms? If you were hungry and someone gave you enough money to eat, that would be a solution regardless of how corrupt your government. I don't know where you live but I'm in the U.S. where it's obvious the number of jobs is going to decline relative to the number of people who need them. Resources won't necessarily decline along with the jobs so I see this as not just applicable to the developing world and not just to solve poverty but to act as a stabilizing force. On what do you base your claim this is a dumb attempt to guilt people? You're suggestion that's the motivation of those who are backing and implementing this test? I don't really understand the idea that no action should be taken unless these conditions are met and these conditions are always outside the reach of those who want to act so they shouldn't act because conditions aren't perfect? I don't think anyone's claiming that testing UI's objective is to see if it will lead to a utopia, otherwise it's a no-go. No, we can't fix poverty if you define fix as a perfect solution that works always and everywhere but if perfect conditions had to be met before anyone acted nobody would do anything productive or useful. I guess I find your line of argument strange because it does not appear to be founded on anything at all that's coherent, though I'm hoping you can alleviate that problem by explaining it coherently.
  - thehardsphere 10y ago
    > How do you define simplistic terms? If you were hungry and someone gave you enough money to eat, that would be a solution regardless of how corrupt your government. Let's work through an example. North Korea is one of the poorest countries in the world, and many people starve there every year. It's also a ruthlessly oppressive totalitarian state; the government decides who can enter and leave the country. The government also runs the entire economy, and directs most of it toward military spending. This is all because the country is essentially under the total control of a single person whose father and grand father decided they like things this way, and the geopolitical situation happened to work out in their favor from 1950 to the present. Suppose you've got an infinite pile of money to give to North Koreans to solve their problems with not having enough food to eat. It's illegal for you to enter that country without permission and illegal for the North Koreans to accept money from foreigners. So how do you give them the money? Let's assume you can give them the money; that you have a big cargo plane you can fly over North Korea and can throw money out the back of and be certain that a deserving poor starving person will receive it. Where is the deserving poor starving person going to go to buy food? There's no private farm to shop at. The government run stores aren't going to take this foreign money. They're stuck with whatever the government dictates will be produced, which is obviously not enough food. Ignore that problem and assume the shopkeeper or the farmer would take the money. What are they going to do with it? Private property is basically illegal in North Korea, so it's not like the farmer is going to save his money to make a better farm that can feed more people. He can only spend money in state run enterprises, which all feed directly into the government, and the government spends it all on Kalishnakov rifles, nuclear weapons programs, and weird foreign assassinations. These things are not great for solving the problems of starvation and poverty. North Korea is the most extreme example, but lots of poor countries have problems like this that cannot be solved by simply throwing money out the back of a cargo plane. Poor societies often need to change to become not-poor.
    - mateus1 10y ago
      Of course cash transfers won't topple dictatorial regimes, that's not what it is for. You can't expect a microeconomics proposal to solve an international political crisis.

Shivetya 10y ago

It is solvable in simplistic terms. It is not solvable by throwing money at it. It just an dumb attempt to guilt people and further this constant bemoaning there are some super rich people in our world. Most people are poor because of their government. Either through corruption, lack of property rights, or wars both internal and external. We cannot fix poverty in this world until people are guaranteed freedom and safety of person and their property.

marmot777 10y ago
How do you define simplistic terms? If you were hungry and someone gave you enough money to eat, that would be a solution regardless of how corrupt your government. I don't know where you live but I'm in the U.S. where it's obvious the number of jobs is going to decline relative to the number of people who need them. Resources won't necessarily decline along with the jobs so I see this as not just applicable to the developing world and not just to solve poverty but to act as a stabilizing force. On what do you base your claim this is a dumb attempt to guilt people? You're suggestion that's the motivation of those who are backing and implementing this test? I don't really understand the idea that no action should be taken unless these conditions are met and these conditions are always outside the reach of those who want to act so they shouldn't act because conditions aren't perfect? I don't think anyone's claiming that testing UI's objective is to see if it will lead to a utopia, otherwise it's a no-go. No, we can't fix poverty if you define fix as a perfect solution that works always and everywhere but if perfect conditions had to be met before anyone acted nobody would do anything productive or useful. I guess I find your line of argument strange because it does not appear to be founded on anything at all that's coherent, though I'm hoping you can alleviate that problem by explaining it coherently.
- thehardsphere 10y ago
  > How do you define simplistic terms? If you were hungry and someone gave you enough money to eat, that would be a solution regardless of how corrupt your government. Let's work through an example. North Korea is one of the poorest countries in the world, and many people starve there every year. It's also a ruthlessly oppressive totalitarian state; the government decides who can enter and leave the country. The government also runs the entire economy, and directs most of it toward military spending. This is all because the country is essentially under the total control of a single person whose father and grand father decided they like things this way, and the geopolitical situation happened to work out in their favor from 1950 to the present. Suppose you've got an infinite pile of money to give to North Koreans to solve their problems with not having enough food to eat. It's illegal for you to enter that country without permission and illegal for the North Koreans to accept money from foreigners. So how do you give them the money? Let's assume you can give them the money; that you have a big cargo plane you can fly over North Korea and can throw money out the back of and be certain that a deserving poor starving person will receive it. Where is the deserving poor starving person going to go to buy food? There's no private farm to shop at. The government run stores aren't going to take this foreign money. They're stuck with whatever the government dictates will be produced, which is obviously not enough food. Ignore that problem and assume the shopkeeper or the farmer would take the money. What are they going to do with it? Private property is basically illegal in North Korea, so it's not like the farmer is going to save his money to make a better farm that can feed more people. He can only spend money in state run enterprises, which all feed directly into the government, and the government spends it all on Kalishnakov rifles, nuclear weapons programs, and weird foreign assassinations. These things are not great for solving the problems of starvation and poverty. North Korea is the most extreme example, but lots of poor countries have problems like this that cannot be solved by simply throwing money out the back of a cargo plane. Poor societies often need to change to become not-poor.
  - mateus1 10y ago
    Of course cash transfers won't topple dictatorial regimes, that's not what it is for. You can't expect a microeconomics proposal to solve an international political crisis.