The End of Poverty: Economic Possibilities for Our Time Review
Jeffery Sachs seems like a perfectly intelligent man full of passion and legitamate concern for the severely impoverished persons throughout the world. This book is quite useful particularly the chapters detailing Sachs travels throughout the world assisting various governments with their economic problems. He has much correct about the economic problems facing the developing world, such as his notion that poverty cannot and should not be treated with a one size fits all approach and that there are no magic bullets when it comes to dealing with the problems of the world.
As I read this book, I couldn't help but think of Hannah Teeter-U.S. Olympic Snowboarder who won medals in Torino and Vancouver and the piece NBC did on her during the Olympics about her various charitable causes in Africa and other parts of the world including helping to provide clean drinking water and other facilities for a village in Kenya. Weren't various international organizations aware of these problems throughout Africa and other areas for years if not decades and it takes private citizens just to provide a well for basic drinking water and Sachs demands we give these agencies more money...uh huh yeah.
However Sachs solution of increasing foreign aid through the UN, IMF, World Bank, and other organizations would seem to be no solution at all. Need I remind Mr. Sachs of the numerous occasions in which the UN and its various agencies have let us down before including various genocides and other relief efforts. Pardon me if I don't have the greatest confidence in the international governing structure. Furthermore, what are we to do, if this big idea does not work? Another quibble is the notion of poverty, my mom makes about 14,000 a year...under Sachs definition we would only be moderately impoverished because we can afford basic needs and an occasional splurge, but I would certainly not call it comfortable knowing that if one thing goes wrong, maybe we won't be able to afford food...government assistance isn't that great.
That being said, Jeff Sachs does get many things right beyond a liberal or conservative bias. The lead-up to the idea is great because it provides a framework that allows the Western reader to see poverty as a worldwide concern that has a stake in the life of even the most jaded wealth possessed Western consumer. The so called solution though, needs work.
The End of Poverty: Economic Possibilities for Our Time Overview
Marrying vivid eyewitness storytelling with concrete analysis, Jeffrey Sachs provides a conceptual map of the world economy and the different categories into which countries fall, explaining why wealth and poverty have diverged and evolved as they have and why the poorest nations have been so markedly unable to escape the cruel vortex of poverty. Sachs plunges into the messy realities of economies, leading his readers through his work in Bolivia, Poland, Russia, India, China, and Africa, and concludes with an integrated set of solutions to the tangled economic, political, environmental, and social issues that most frequently hold societies back.
The End of Poverty: Economic Possibilities for Our Time Specifications
Celebrated economist Jeffrey Sachs has a plan to eliminate extreme poverty around the world by 2025. If you think that is too ambitious or wildly unrealistic, you need to read this book. His focus is on the one billion poorest individuals around the world who are caught in a poverty trap of disease, physical isolation, environmental stress, political instability, and lack of access to capital, technology, medicine, and education. The goal is to help these people reach the first rung on the "ladder of economic development" so they can rise above mere subsistence level and achieve some control over their economic futures and their lives. To do this, Sachs proposes nine specific steps, which he explains in great detail in The End of Poverty. Though his plan certainly requires the help of rich nations, the financial assistance Sachs calls for is surprisingly modest--more than is now provided, but within the bounds of what has been promised in the past. For the U.S., for instance, it would mean raising foreign aid from just 0.14 percent of GNP to 0.7 percent. Sachs does not view such help as a handout but rather an investment in global economic growth that will add to the security of all nations. In presenting his argument, he offers a comprehensive education on global economics, including why globalization should be embraced rather than fought, why international institutions such as the United Nations, International Monetary Fund, and World Bank need to play a strong role in this effort, and the reasons why extreme poverty exists in the midst of great wealth. He also shatters some persistent myths about poor people and shows how developing nations can do more to help themselves.
Despite some crushing statistics, The End of Poverty is a hopeful book. Based on a tremendous amount of data and his own experiences working as an economic advisor to the UN and several individual nations, Sachs makes a strong moral, economic, and political case for why countries and individuals should battle poverty with the same commitment and focus normally reserved for waging war. This important book not only makes the end of poverty seem realistic, but in the best interest of everyone on the planet, rich and poor alike. --Shawn Carkonen
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