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That should be expected after having decades of free movement of capital, free movement of goods, but restricted movement of people. That maintains labour arbit

That should be expected after having decades of free movement of capital, free movement of goods, but restricted movement of people. That maintains labour arbitrage which leads to wealthy countries becoming wealthier

ChrisLomont 5y ago
Hasn't the global trend been for decades now that poor countries are becoming wealthier? The rich countries have had very little comparative growth. https://databank.worldbank.org/reports.aspx?source=2&series=NY.GDP.MKTP.PP.KD&country=# https://databank.worldbank.org/reports.aspx?source=2&series=...
- andrewmutz 5y ago
  Both are growing and getting wealthier. IIRC on a percentage basis the poorer countries are benefitting more, but in absolute terms the wealth countries are benefitting more (the wealthier countries have a lower percentage because they are already so wealthy) From what I've read, most economists say that allowing more immigration between countries would improve both the lives of the people who move, and those of the destination country. I think it is worse for the country that they leave, but on net increased immigration would significantly increase global economic conditions
- danans 5y ago
  https://www.lse.ac.uk/International-Inequalities/Assets/Documents/Working-Papers/III-Working-Paper-24-mapping-recent-inequality-trends-in-developing-countries.pdf https://www.lse.ac.uk/International-Inequalities/Assets/Docu... The rate of growth is indeed faster in developing countries than developed countries. This is to be expected given that they recently started at a lower level of development. In rich countries, however, inequality has trended up, while in many developing countries it has trended downwards. But even that is a mixed bag. In the largest developing economies (China and India), inequality is increasing, so the rich are getting richer there faster than the poor are getting richer. Of course, the jump for many people from utter poverty to having even the basics is a massive one. It gets more complicated though. In Latin America, inequality is generally decreasing despite relatively high growth. In the developed world, inequality has grown as those with investments and/or skills tied to global growth have seen their wealth rise, while people lacking either of those have seen wealth decline. This phenomenon and the disinvestment in public infrastructure that has accompanied it, has been credited with the recent populist swing in politics in the developed world.
  - thow-58d4e8b 5y ago
    To underscore how ridiculously rich the rich are in developing countries, one can take a look at country sheets in World Inequality Report 2022 (1) Adjusted for price level, excluding the top 1%, and focusing on the 90-99% percentile: income in the UK is $117k. That's less than in Chile ($130k), Turkey ($149k), and comparable to Mexico ($99k) or South Africa ($82k). Meanwhile, the bottom 50% in the UK earn 3-10x of what their peers in the aforementioned countries do. And UK is hardly a paragon of equality to begin with Another sobering fact from the linked report - of the countries where the 90-99th percentile earns surprisingly good bucks - all have a large impoverished underclass: Israel, Chile, South Africa, Mexico, USA, Korea, Russia, Brazil (1) https://wir2022.wid.world/download/ https://wir2022.wid.world/download/
csomar 5y ago
You got it backward buddy. If Western countries imported workers, they would not need to externalize their industry. As a result, third-world countries will remain as poor and undeveloped as 30 years ago. Offshoring basically transferred some of the wealth from the bottom middle-class/lower-class to the developing/poor world. The arbitrage value went to some lucky dudes who knew how to play these international games. But these days are over. And it's hitting poor countries hard and making illegal immigration a more apparent problem.

ChrisLomont 5y ago

Hasn't the global trend been for decades now that poor countries are becoming wealthier? The rich countries have had very little comparative growth. https://databank.worldbank.org/reports.aspx?source=2&series=NY.GDP.MKTP.PP.KD&country=# https://databank.worldbank.org/reports.aspx?source=2&series=...

andrewmutz 5y ago
Both are growing and getting wealthier. IIRC on a percentage basis the poorer countries are benefitting more, but in absolute terms the wealth countries are benefitting more (the wealthier countries have a lower percentage because they are already so wealthy) From what I've read, most economists say that allowing more immigration between countries would improve both the lives of the people who move, and those of the destination country. I think it is worse for the country that they leave, but on net increased immigration would significantly increase global economic conditions
danans 5y ago
https://www.lse.ac.uk/International-Inequalities/Assets/Documents/Working-Papers/III-Working-Paper-24-mapping-recent-inequality-trends-in-developing-countries.pdf https://www.lse.ac.uk/International-Inequalities/Assets/Docu... The rate of growth is indeed faster in developing countries than developed countries. This is to be expected given that they recently started at a lower level of development. In rich countries, however, inequality has trended up, while in many developing countries it has trended downwards. But even that is a mixed bag. In the largest developing economies (China and India), inequality is increasing, so the rich are getting richer there faster than the poor are getting richer. Of course, the jump for many people from utter poverty to having even the basics is a massive one. It gets more complicated though. In Latin America, inequality is generally decreasing despite relatively high growth. In the developed world, inequality has grown as those with investments and/or skills tied to global growth have seen their wealth rise, while people lacking either of those have seen wealth decline. This phenomenon and the disinvestment in public infrastructure that has accompanied it, has been credited with the recent populist swing in politics in the developed world.
- thow-58d4e8b 5y ago
  To underscore how ridiculously rich the rich are in developing countries, one can take a look at country sheets in World Inequality Report 2022 (1) Adjusted for price level, excluding the top 1%, and focusing on the 90-99% percentile: income in the UK is $117k. That's less than in Chile ($130k), Turkey ($149k), and comparable to Mexico ($99k) or South Africa ($82k). Meanwhile, the bottom 50% in the UK earn 3-10x of what their peers in the aforementioned countries do. And UK is hardly a paragon of equality to begin with Another sobering fact from the linked report - of the countries where the 90-99th percentile earns surprisingly good bucks - all have a large impoverished underclass: Israel, Chile, South Africa, Mexico, USA, Korea, Russia, Brazil (1) https://wir2022.wid.world/download/ https://wir2022.wid.world/download/

csomar 5y ago

You got it backward buddy. If Western countries imported workers, they would not need to externalize their industry. As a result, third-world countries will remain as poor and undeveloped as 30 years ago. Offshoring basically transferred some of the wealth from the bottom middle-class/lower-class to the developing/poor world. The arbitrage value went to some lucky dudes who knew how to play these international games. But these days are over. And it's hitting poor countries hard and making illegal immigration a more apparent problem.