MaxShimba
JF-Expert Member
- Apr 11, 2008
- 35,772
- 4,054
Since the terrorist attacks, Americans have learned that in many Arab and Muslim nations there are large numbers of angry young men with time on their hands, unable to find jobs -- or jobs that make use of their education -- because of their countries' poverty. We've also learned that many Muslims blame us for their poverty. But in fact they are not poor because we are rich; they are poor because of the policies their countries pursue.
What matters for economic growth is what a country does, not what it has. Japan, Switzerland, the Netherlands and Israel have no natural resources, yet they have successful, developed economies; Nigeria and the Congo, with abundant resources, do not. Nor is the availability of capital, by itself, the answer. In many Arab nations, the local rich invest their money outside their own countries and may have good economic reasons for doing so.
Perhaps the most important cause for some countries' continuing to fall behind is the monopolies that many of them tolerate or even create. The bin Laden family, for example, is rich because it was given a monopoly over much construction activity in Saudi Arabia. A recent estimate for sub-Saharan Africa estimated that the growth rates in all but a few countries could triple with no infusion of additional resources if state-created monopolies were dismantled in businesses like buying and selling grain or exporting textiles.
Source New York Times
What matters for economic growth is what a country does, not what it has. Japan, Switzerland, the Netherlands and Israel have no natural resources, yet they have successful, developed economies; Nigeria and the Congo, with abundant resources, do not. Nor is the availability of capital, by itself, the answer. In many Arab nations, the local rich invest their money outside their own countries and may have good economic reasons for doing so.
Perhaps the most important cause for some countries' continuing to fall behind is the monopolies that many of them tolerate or even create. The bin Laden family, for example, is rich because it was given a monopoly over much construction activity in Saudi Arabia. A recent estimate for sub-Saharan Africa estimated that the growth rates in all but a few countries could triple with no infusion of additional resources if state-created monopolies were dismantled in businesses like buying and selling grain or exporting textiles.
Source New York Times