Can foreign aid end world poverty?

[brendan]

http://www.ide.go.jp/Japanese/Lecture/Sympo/2007/pdf/easterly_hand.pdf

[Rietie]

Didn't read the link.
But my answer to the question is: no.
As long as developed countries continue to live in wealth and luxury, other countries will continue to live in poverty.

[brendan]

that isn't a reason

[AppleXY]

lol what kind of reason is that rofl. So what you are saying is that if "wealthy" countries grow more wealth, the "poor" countries will enter into greater poverty ?

:S

[Eriny]

Maybe that if the wealthy countries continue to maintain a similar percentage of the world's wealth, then poor countries will also continue to have a small percentage of the world's wealth?

[Collin Li]

Hmm... but if enough wealth was created, and the percentages remained the same, poverty could be ended (unless you have a ridiculous 'relativistic' view of poverty, where by definition, it is impossible to eradicate poverty)

[Eriny]

I do agree, but I've heard that it's apparently impossible to feed the entire world, on say, the average American diet (though you could feed it a few times with a minimal vegetarian diet). What I mean to say is that with the amount of resources there are, there will be a limit as to how much total food there can be in the world if countries like ours and America keep insisting on eating the way we do and other countries start to partake in this kind of eating as well. I have no idea if this means that absolute poverty will always exist if we don't change though, I suspect not, though if every country tried to eat like us, it probably could ensure that absolute poverty persisted.

Hopefully that made sense.

[bubble sunglasses]

 so in conlcusion: wealth creation [and enjoyment] isn't inherently a zero-sum game, but, in the world today, it is, to a large extent

[sxcalexc]

The problem with foreign aid is how it is distributed. Money needs to be spent on infrastructure so that third-world countries can maintain themselves and subsequently educate more workers.

[brendan]

 so in conlcusion: wealth creation [and enjoyment] isn't inherently a zero-sum game, but, in the world today, it is, to a large extent

it's interesting that you contradict yourself in the same sentence.

[bubble sunglasses]

 so in conlcusion: wealth creation [and enjoyment] isn't inherently a zero-sum game, but, in the world today, it is, to a large extent

it's interesting that you contradict yourself in the same sentence.

  no I didn't. Perhaps I could have said "not in theory, but often in practice" for greater clarity. However, there is nothing contradictory about saying an object doesn't always have a particular quality, but often is found to have that particular quality: ie "dresses aren't always red, but they often are"

[brendan]

You said:

wealth creation [and enjoyment] isn't inherently a zero-sum game, but, in the world today, it is, to a large extent

So to use the dress example it would actually read:

"Dresses aren't inherently red, but, in the world today, it is, to a large extent"

On wealth creation, why is it a zero sum game?

[bubble sunglasses]

 my lexis was poor, granted, but i didn't contradict myself

[Collin Li]

http://www.realclearmarkets.com/articles/2008/11/poor_arent_poor_because_rich_a.html