Maybe. Here is my opinion. The poor need goods and services just like the rest of us. More to the point of the article, they also require credit and some fai

Maybe. Here is my opinion. The poor need goods and services just like the rest of us. More to the point of the article, they also require credit and some faith in their productivity, to even attempt to rise out of their situation. Theoretically, an efficient market will help provide credit to the poor people most able to use it in a productive manner. In reality, it seems like things get a little non-linear below the poverty line. By definition, those in poverty can't reach up to meet the price of goods (including credit) in the general market. Also by definition, a market exists only when buyer and seller reach a mutually beneficial agreement. So it seems that when those who are not poor are dealing with the poor, they are not acting as rational market participants because they may not reach a mutually beneficial equilibrium. Who would even try? I think this is why micro-finance needs to be a somewhat humanitarian effort. Coincidentally. the economic crisis engulfing the U.S. right now is an example of why profiting from the poor doesn't work (well...without some productivity requirements). Not lending to the poor, per se, but lending to people who had no chance (and possibly no intention) of using the credit productively and paying it back. This has partly been due to incentives which are/were outside of the market between lender and borrower -- fees, and a secondary market which was hungry for securitized debt. The demand in the secondary market was met by trying to do the impossible (lending on bad bets) and selling it off as a package of good bets. This last bit should actually make you upset on many levels. The U.S. patent office won't accept inventions which violate the laws of thermodynamics, and I'm still confused why the Federal Reserve does...sorry, on a tangent. Back to the salt mines for me!