🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <33985B04.167@xtra.co.nz>, John William Rich <J.W.Rich@xtra.co.nz> writes:

>However, if we really want to do something about starvation, after the
>feeling comes a willingness to sacrifice. Then the real issue becomes,
>are we fat cat westerners prepared to take a cut in our standard of
>living so that the starving get fed. 

That's based on the ages old fallacious belief that economy is a zero 
sum game and whenever somebody's standard of living is improving, it 
is due to the exploitation of somebody else.  We've ample evidence 
that it ain't so.

There was an economic system based on this belief.  Assuming that by 
taking from the fat cats it'll improve the lot of the people at large 
it did indeed manage to create equality of sorts, by reducing most 
everybody to poverty.  Need I name it?

It's not just a matter of handing
>out food - long term it must be about allowing free trade on the planet
>so people can feed themselves by being able to sell what they've got,
>even if it is only their sweat and toil. And us allowing them to compete
>in our markets - even if it costs us some jobs locally. 

Guess what, there is the trade nowadys is more free than it was for a 
very long time and "they" are free to compete in our markets.  Some 
nations which used to be third world countries are prosperous nowadays
(Singapore, Taiwan, Hong-Kong, to name but a few) and their prosperity 
is based on global trade.  Of course they also have stable governments 
which support business, not kleptocracies, which may have something to 
do with their success.

>I'll bet more money is spent on the issue of obesity in the US (and it's
>related problems) than is spent on aid to the starving - isn't that
>insane????
>
I happened to read just few days ago (in one of the articles 
commemorating the 50th anniversary of the Marshall Plan) that the 
total amount of aid which the countries in Sub-Saharan Africa received 
from the affluent countries since 1970 is (after correcting for 
inflation) more than 4 times as large as the Marshall Plan.  Somehow, 
it didn't do much good.

Mati Meron                      | "When you argue with a fool,
meron@cars.uchicago.edu         |  chances are he is doing just the same"