Jan
30
2006
I’ve been reading the words of Kenyan Economist James Shikwati and his interview: For God’s Sake, Please Stop the Aid!:
Huge bureaucracies are financed (with the aid money), corruption and complacency are promoted, Africans are taught to be beggars and not to be independent. In addition, development aid weakens the local markets everywhere and dampens the spirit of entrepreneurship that we so desperately need. As absurd as it may sound: Development aid is one of the reasons for Africa’s problems. If the West were to cancel these payments, normal Africans wouldn’t even notice. Only the functionaries would be hard hit. Which is why they maintain that the world would stop turning without this development aid.”
at some point, this corn ends up in the harbor of Mombasa. A portion of the corn often goes directly into the hands of unsrupulous politicians who then pass it on to their own tribe to boost their next election campaign. Another portion of the shipment ends up on the black market where the corn is dumped at extremely low prices. Local farmers may as well put down their hoes right away; no one can compete with the UN’s World Food Program. And because the farmers go under in the face of this pressure, Kenya would have no reserves to draw on if there actually were a famine next year. It’s a simple but fatal cycle.”
Continue Reading »
Jan
29
2006
Here is an interesting quote from an AARP/Roper Poll
Having Fun As We Age: A Survey of Adult Funstyles. Maybe there are more closet Do-Gooders out there than we thought:
Men not only pretend to like things they do, they wish they could be doing
something else. Asked to identify certain secret wishes and desires, a
majority of men says they ?often? or ?occasionally? wish they could be
doing good deeds for others (83%), have a more meaningful life (61%), be
more successful at work (60%), and have a more satisfying sex life (56%).”
Women share many of the same secret passions?doing good deeds for
others (84%), having a more meaningful life (59%), and being more
successful at work (52%), among them.”
Jan
27
2006
I recently talked to a woman in Arizona who told me that she was afraid to fly in to San Diego because “the airport is unsafe.” I told her that as far as I knew, the airport had a perfect safety record (except for a mid-air crash long ago in the landing pattern that had nothing to do with the airport itself). She said that she felt better driving. I mentioned that there were probably dozens of accidents on Interstate 8. She said that she knew this, but still felt safer driving.
I decided that it would be nice to quantify risk a little better, so I came up with Lightning Strike Equivalents (LSE) to compare activities. One LSE is the risk of getting struck by lighting in your lifetime. Activities rated 1000 LSEs are a 1000 times more likely to kill you than a lightning strike, etc.
I scrounged around the National Safety Council, 2002 statistics on Accidental cause of death and created my very own Lightning Strike Equivalent Table.
These numbers aren’t very good (yet). For example, representing transportation deaths by passenger miles, rather than just absolute numbers. But they do show some interesting things. For example, your chances of being done in by a bathtub fall are 5.3 times that of being struck by lightning.
On a more somber note, however: in 2002, suicide (Intentional Self Harm) accounted for 31,655 deaths (479 LSE), while murder (Assault) accounted for 17,638 (267). Americans were almost twice as likely to die of suicide than murder.
Jan
27
2006
I am one of Pam and Pierre Omidyar’s greatest fans. I really support their goals and values. and have been an active supporter of the Omidyar Network almost since its beginning.
They have recently made a $100 million gift to their alma mater, Tufts University, to support microfinance Omidyar-Tufts Microfinance Fund – Tufts University:
“This fund clearly demonstrates that it is possible to do well by doing good. We expect Pierre’s innovative idea to empower millions of people in developing nations – and to generate significant income to Tufts as the microfinance investments produce returns. Fifty percent of the investment income from the Omidyar-Tufts Microfinance Fund will be available for Tufts to use in support of both our faculty and students.”
The history of international development is full of unintended consequences. While I applaud the effort to make this investment, I have to express some reservations about the flow of capital in this arrangement. The investment income comes from the poorest women in the world. Is this really helping these women? Is this really empowering them?
I sure hope so. But I have to wonder: wouldn’t it be better to have this capital stay in the villages themselves?
Jan
27
2006
I’ve been away from my blog for a while, and since I had the post below “Whatever happened to Google’s 1% Better World Funding?” showing for so long, I thought it was time to link to their response last October : Google.org
See also First Light From Google
