Tag Archives: World Bank

Latest Developments, April 15

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Ocampo out
Reuters reports that former Colombian finance minister Jose Antonio Ocampo has dropped out of the race to become the next World Bank president, leaving only two candidates “in an unprecedented challenge to U.S. control of the global development institution”.
“With the board of the World Bank to meet on Monday to pick a new president, Ocampo said he hoped emerging-market nations would rally behind Nigerian Finance Minister Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala in a race that he said had turned highly political.
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While Kim is still the favorite to win the World Bank presidency due to backing from the United States and European countries, a rigorous challenge from developing countries could put them in a stronger position to extract concessions.”

Bad diet
The Guardian reports on new research suggesting the fertilizers used to provide people in wealthy countries with their meat-heavy diets are contributing substantially to climate change.
“It’s arguably the most difficult challenge in dealing with climate change: how to reduce emissions from food production while still producing enough to feed a global population projected to reach 9 billion by the middle of this century.
The findings, by Eric Davidson, director of the Woods Hole Research Centre in Massachusetts, say the developed world will have to cut fertiliser use by 50% and persuade consumers in the developed world to stop eating so much meat.”

Fallujah’s legacy
Inter Press Service reports on the high number of birth defects in Fallujah, the scene of heavy fighting between US forces and Iraqi insurgents in the last decade.
“According to a study released by the Switzerland-based International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health in July 2010, ‘the increases in cancer, leukaemia and infant mortality and perturbations of the normal human population birth sex ratio in Fallujah are significantly greater than those reported for the survivors of the A-Bombs at Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945.’
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Other than the white phosphorus, many point to depleted uranium (DU), a radioactive element which, according to military engineers, significantly increases the penetration capacity of shells. DU is believed to have a life of 4.5 billion years, and it has been labelled the ‘silent murderer that never stops killing.’ Several international organisations have called on NATO to investigate whether DU was also used during the Libyan war.

SNC-Lavalin raid
The Globe and Mail reports that Canadian police have raided the headquarters of scandal-ridden engineering giant SNC-Lavalin, though the reasons for the action have not been disclosed.
“Friday’s raid was the second time in six months that RCMP officials have descended with search warrants on the company, which gained an international reputation as one of the world’s leading engineering firms but is now grappling with scandals, executive departures, questions about its business ethics and allegations of involvement in a plot to help a son of Moammar Gadhafi escape from Libya.
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Investigations into SNC’s conduct are under way in Canada, Bangladesh, India, Mexico and Libya. SNC has also conducted an internal probe into allegations that $56-million in improper payments went to commercial agents to help secure construction contracts in unnamed countries.”

Extractive land grabs
The Gaia Foundation’s Teresa Anderson writes about a new study that suggests the oil, gas and mining industries are increasingly responsible for so-called land grabs in poor countries.
“The extractive industries have grown significantly in the last 10 years, due to changes in consumption patterns, and a throwaway culture where regular technology upgrades are considered the norm. In the last 10 years, exploration budgets have increased nine-fold, from 2 billion to 18 billion dollars.
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Today, copper extraction requires the removal of 10 times as much earth as 100 years ago. A single gold wedding ring requires 20 tonnes of earth. Technological developments have enabled extraction from hard-to-reach deposits, as seen with the development of hydraulic fracturing or ‘fracking’ for shale gas deposits. In South Africa, a consortium of international investors has applied for the rights to drill for shale gas for a section covering around 10 per cent of the country’s surface.”

Aid measurement
The Overseas Development Institute’s Jonathan Glennie and Annalisa Prizzon make the case for “aid as a proportion of the economy” as a new way of classifying countries.
“The 0.7% target is an important symbol, but it can obscure the focus on what’s really important, which is not the proportion of donor income given in aid, but the proportion of the recipient economy depending on it. High levels of aid, while sometimes necessary in the short term, are increasingly viewed as antithetical to development in the longer term.”

Drone coverage
Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting’s Peter Hart takes issue with American media coverage of the Pakistani parliament’s recent  vote for an end to US drone strikes.
“The Washington Post’s account of this news included this curious observation:
‘From Washington’s perspective, the debate in Parliament was a healthy exercise in democracy but one that is unlikely to affect the drone war. The military leaders of both nations see the drones as efficient and effective in eliminating hard-core Islamic militants that plague both the U.S. and Pakistani armies.’
I know that the Post is merely conveying ‘Washington’s perspective,’ but let’s think about this for a second. A sign of a healthy democracy is one where civilian political leadership has no power over the military–either in its own country or a nominal ally launching air attacks on its soil?”


Bottoming out
ECONorthwest’s Ann Hollingshead asks “at what point does the ‘race to the bottom’ bottom out” when it comes to international tax competition.
“While [the Cato Institute’s Dan Mitchell] argues tax competition through tax evasion in havens has fostered lower tax rates worldwide, he has also reckoned that ‘only a tiny minority’ of people who keep their money in havens ‘are escaping onerous tax burdens.’ First of all, I would be interested to see where Mitchell got that statistic because no one knows how much money is deposited in havens, let alone its origins. Such information isn’t publicly available. That’s actually the whole point. And secondly, and more importantly, I’m unclear on how such a ‘tiny minority’ of oversees deposits could drive international tax policy to such an extent that the average corporate tax rates have dropped by more than half in thirty years.”

Latest Developments, April 5

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Kony 2012, part II
The Guardian reports that the London School of Economics’ Craig Valters believes the newly released sequel to Invisible Children’s mega-viral video fails to address the criticism against its predecessor.
“Again, there is plenty of talk of turning power on its head. A form of ‘revolution’ as Ocampo put it. Firstly, who is harnessing this power? It certainly isn’t local Ugandans, who barely feature in either film, and who (judging from press reports) do not like the film one bit. Secondly, the film makes no mention of the UPDF (who the US has funded and worked with closely) who have committed many human rights violations. Thirdly, the film-makers (given their affiliation with Ocampo) clearly want Kony tried by the ICC. But the ICC is itself highly politicised, and has been criticised for failing to go after more powerful actors who have also committed crimes.”

LRA response
A document has appeared online, purporting to be a response by the Lord’s Resistance Army’s “Peace Team” to the Kony 2012 video.
“[Invisible Children’s] continued role is, to help sanitize the murderous regime of the army republic of Uganda – and maximally demonize the armed guerrillas in Uganda including the LRA – by working to pile all that is discreditable on the guerrillas, who are only one of the parties in the wars that the army regime has waged against the people of Uganda – while exculpating the murderous military machine of the regime of the army republic from any and all blame.
The principal endeavor of the masters of the Invisible Children is however to divert the attention of the people of Uganda and world democratic opinion from focusing on the real problems that face our African people under the army republic of Uganda and the search for their necessary resolution.”

Debt suicide
Reuters reports that the suicide of a pensioner outside the Greek parliament has turned into “symbol of the pain of austerity.”
“The 77-year-old retired pharmacist, Dimitris Christoulas, shot himself in the head on Wednesday after saying that financial troubles had pushed him over the edge. A suicide note said he preferred to die than scavenge for food.
The highly public – and symbolic – nature of the suicide prompted an outpouring of sympathy from Greeks, who set up an impromptu shrine where he killed himself with hand-written notes condemning the crisis. Some protested at night, clashing with riot police who sent them home in clouds of tear gas.”

Blaming Apple
In a letter to the New York Times, former UN special representative for business and human rights, John Ruggie, writes that Apple “contributes directly” to the well publicized problems at its Chinese supplier factories.
“Imposing stricter conditions on suppliers alone isn’t going to solve this problem. The brands also have to acknowledge their role and change their own practices accordingly. All major brands that source their products overseas, including Apple, have supplier codes of conduct. The time has come for them also to consider codes of responsible ordering practices.”

Drone HQ
The BBC asks “what it means to wage war from afar” during its visit to a New Mexico base where American and British personnel control drones.
” ‘I think it’s only controversial in terms of the media – they will make it controversial,’ said [Squadron Leader “Dex”].
‘We train to operate a weapon system in exactly the same way we would train in a manned aircraft – and we do the same job.
‘So to us there’s nothing controversial about it. Through our training and our smart decisions we avoid collateral damage as best we can. All of our engagements, all of our missions are legitimate and legal.’ ”

Decolonizing the franc zone
Former African Development Bank executive Sanou Mbaye calls the CFA franc zone “a formula for perpetual mass capital flight” from Africa to France.
“The CFA franc’s fixed exchange rate is pegged to the euro and overvalued in order to shield French companies from euro depreciation. But the currency’s overvaluation also underlies the lack of competitiveness that curbs franc-zone countries’ capacity to diversify their economies, create added value, and develop. Scandalously, they still have to surrender 50% of their foreign-exchange reserves to the French Treasury as a guarantee of the CFA franc’s limited convertibility and free transfer to France.
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It is no wonder that the franc-zone countries have been unable to catch up with the performance of neighboring economies, most of which are undergoing the most prosperous period in their history. Since 2000, sub-Saharan African countries’ annual GDP growth has averaged 5-7%, compared to 2.5-3% for the franc zone. This gap should encourage the franc zone’s member countries to reject their relationship with France.”

Vying for influence
The Financial Times’ Alan Beattie writes that the World Bank’s structural inequality runs deeper than the US monopoly over the institution’s presidency.
“Emerging markets also complain that the bank’s lending practices give advanced countries control over the institution’s policy that is disproportionately large given their financial contributions. Much of the surplus from the commercial loans arm, which lends to middle-income countries, is ploughed back into the bank to provide low-cost loans and grants to the poorest nations. But control over those recycled funds rests largely with rich countries, which donate money on top and hold about half the voting power over the entire budget.”

Mismeasuring wealth
The time has come to replace GDP with “new indicators that tell us if we are destroying the productive base that supports our well-being,” according to the University of Cambridge’s Partha Dasgupta and the International Human Dimensions Programme’s Anantha Duraiappah.
“The United Nations University’s International Human Dimensions Program (UNU-IHDP) is already working to find these indicators for its ‘Inclusive Wealth Report’ (IWR), which proposes an approach to sustainability based on natural, manufactured, human, and social capital.
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The IWR represents a crucial first step in transforming the global economic paradigm, by ensuring that we have the correct information with which to assess our economic development and well-being – and to reassess our needs and goals. While it is not intended as a universal indicator for sustainability, it does offer a framework for dialogue with multiple constituencies from the environmental, social, and economic fields.”

Latest Developments, March 26

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NATO secrecy
The New York Times’ C.J. Chivers writes that NATO is withholding information regarding civilian casualties of its Libyan campaign.
“In previous statements, [NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh] Rasmussen had said that there were no ‘confirmed’ civilian casualties caused by NATO in the entire war. That ringing denial overlooked two points: NATO’s definition of a ‘confirmed casualty’ is a casualty that has been investigated by NATO; and because the alliance has refused to look into credible allegations of the scores of civilian deaths that independent investigations have found it caused, it is impossible for the official tally to rise above zero.”

Nominee controversy
The Financial Times reports the US nominee for World Bank president is “under fire” over a 2000 book he co-edited, which was highly critical of “neoliberal” economic policies.
“But colleagues of Dr [Jim Yong] Kim and officials at the US Treasury said that when taken in context he was simply arguing that the distribution of gains from economic growth decides whether it makes life better for the poorest. They pointed out that such criticisms were widespread in the late 1990s and the World Bank had since changed its practices to take account of them.
‘Jim Kim is a brilliant man and fully understands the need for economic growth. What we have said in the book is that economic growth, in and of itself, is insufficient and will not automatically lead to a better life for everyone,’ said Joyce Millen, one of the co-editors of Dying for Growth, and associate professor of anthropology at Willamette University in Salem, Oregon.”

Mining claims
The CBC reports that a coalition of human rights groups has filed for Canada’s highest court to hear a lawsuit against a Canadian mining company for its alleged contributions to a massacre of civilians in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
“The groups allege that Anvil Mining Limited provided logistical support to the Congolese military who raped and murdered people as it crushed a rebel uprising in 2004, killing as many as 100 people in the port city of Kilwa.
That support allegedly included planes, trucks and drivers instrumental in ending the conflict. The port was key to the operation of a copper mine, the exit point for $500,000 worth of copper and silver every day.”

German apology
The Namibian reports on the growing pressure on Germany’s parliament to make amends for crimes committed in its former colony – now called Namibia – during the early 20th Century.
“More than 100 German NGOs have now signed the ‘No Amnesty to Genocide’ appeal to the German parliament joining the demand for a formal apology for the genocide and reparations.
The Left Party’s motion was debated in the Bundestag last Thursday, and the Social Democratic Party (SPD) and Green Party had also introduced similar motions, the latter of which [No Amnesty to Genocide’s Christian] Kopp said made no mention of payments of reparations.
Instead, said Kopp, the SPD and Green Party in their motions simply focus on demanding for the revival of the reconciliation initiative in the context of intensive development aid, and initiative he said was from the start unilaterally implemented with limited success so far.”

Private security boom
The BBC reports on the growing presence of foreign private military firms in and around Somalia.
“Another rapid growth area is the business of armed contractors hired to protect ships in Somalia from on board – a practice officially sanctioned for British ships by Prime Minister David Cameron in October.
Prof Chris Kinsey, a security expert at King’s College London, says Britain’s private security firms were “following the cash cow” much like they did in Iraq in 2003.
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He predicts the recent discovery of oil in the region will generate even more work as “huge capital assets” like tankers and drilling ships need protection.”

Internet inequality
The Atlantic reports on new findings that suggest the “lion’s share” of online content still comes from the US and Europe.
“ ‘Many commentators speculated that [the Internet] would allow people outside of industrialised nations to gain access to all networked and codified knowledge, thus mitigating the traditionally concentrated nature of information production and consumption,’ [the Oxford Internet Institute’s Corinne Flick] writes. ‘These early expectations remain largely unrealised.’ ”

Speed kills
The Brookings Institution’s Kevin Watkins writes that Western actors bear some of the blame for the huge number of fatal road accidents in poor countries.
“The global nature of the crisis is epitomised by the road linking Kenya’s capital Nairobi to the port of Mombasa. Upgraded into an eight-lane superhighway with support from the World Bank and other donors, speed is up and journey times are down.
Pity they forgot about the children, hundreds of whom cross the road to get from their homes in the sprawling slum of Kibera to primary school. ‘It makes me scared every single day,’ Mary Kitunga, 12, told me.
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Car companies talk about road safety, but people come a distant second to profit when they spot a market opportunity. That’s why major multinational companies operate one set of vehicle standards for the US and another for Brazil.”

Co-development
The Overseas Development Institute’s Jonathan Glennie makes a case for moving beyond aid and its one-way approach to sharing solutions.
“In 2010 Nigel Crisp, a former chief executive of Britain’s National Health Service, published an extraordinary book called Turning the World Upside Down: The Search for Global Health in the 21st Century. Like this [Global Health Strategies Initiatives] report, he argues that the solutions to global health problems are now at least as likely to come from unexpected sources in the developing world as from the west. But he goes a step further, bringing out lessons that rich countries can learn from poorer ones, and treating health similarly in rich and poor countries alike.
Crisp’s talk of ‘co-development’ rather than rich-poor international development resonates in this era of shifting power, and with a blog I wrote a few years ago arguing something similar. When western audiences start to look to poorer countries for solutions in health and in other sectors, they will finally have moved on from the era of aid.”

Latest Developments, March 25

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World Bank nomination
Boston University’s Muhammad Zaman praises the Obama administration’s choice of nominee for World Bank president – a position held exclusively by US citizens since the institution’s foundation – though not because of Jim Yong Kim’s Korean birth.
“The argument about him being a great choice because of the country of his birth, a developing Korea of the 1960s, is not particularly strong. He was fortunate to be raised by highly educated parents in the U.S. and went to some of the best institutions in the country for his training. To me, it was what he did with that training is the most interesting and exciting part. It is his deep conviction to change the status quo in global health, and his innovations in both research and practice that set him apart. From ‘Partners in Health,’ a paradigm shift in global health practice, to WHO, Harvard and then leadership at Dartmouth map the course of a man who has the necessary intellect to create bold and transformative changes for some of the most pressing problems of our time.”

Nuclear morality
United Press International reports that US President Barack Obama has said his country has a “moral obligation” to reduce its nuclear arsenal.
“ ‘I believe the United States has a unique responsibility to act — indeed, we have a moral obligation,’ Obama told students at South Korea’s Hankuk University of Foreign Studies.
‘I say this as president of the only nation ever to use nuclear weapons,’ Obama said. ‘I say it as a commander in chief who knows that our nuclear codes are never far from my side. Most of all, I say it as a father, who wants my two young daughters to grow up in a world where everything they know and love can’t be instantly wiped out.’ ”

Floating armouries
The Associated Press reports that private security companies are maintaining “floating armories” in international waters off Africa’s east coast so as to skirt laws governing the movement of weapons.
“Floating armories have become a viable business in the wake of increased security practices by the maritime industry, which has struggled for years to combat attacks by Somali pirates. But those in the industry say the standards vary widely.
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There are between 10 and 12 ships operating as floating armories at any one time. About half a dozen are located in the Red Sea, three off the United Arab Emirates and a couple off the island nation of Madagascar, said Thomas Jakobsson of Sea Marshals Ltd.”

Shell mega-suit
Agence France-Presse reports British lawyers representing over 11,000 Nigerian plaintiffs have launched a lawsuit against oil giant Shell over spills in the Niger Delta.
“Shell’s Nigerian unit, Shell Petroleum Development Company of Nigeria (SPDC), has admitted liability for two spills of a total of about 4,000 barrels, after the spills were independently verified.
But Shell strongly contests the claims of London-based lawyers Leigh Day that some 500,000 barrels were spilled, arguing that the majority of spills are caused by illegal attempts to tap into pipelines.
Most of the claims were brought by people who claim their livelihood as fishermen has been destroyed.”

New UN expert
The Center for International Environmental Law reports that the UN Human Rights Council has agreed to appoint an independent expert on human rights and the environment.
“The Council’s resolution establishes an institutional vehicle to advance the linkages between Human Rights and the Environment.  It is expected that this new Special Procedure will lay the basis for the Council’s recognition of a universal right to a healthy environment.  In addition the new Independent Expert is tasked with identifying and promoting best practices relating to the use of human rights obligations to strengthen environmental protection.”

Pax ethnica
Queen’s University’s Will Kymlicka reviews a book that aims to “resuscitate the dream” of multiculturalism by showcasing five examples of ethnic harmony from around the world.
“And yet I worry about the strategy of invoking ‘unsung exceptions.’ After all, the very idea that these are exceptions implies that ethnic conflict is the norm. And, indeed, the authors describe these five cases as ‘harbingers of multiethnic peace in an otherwise feral world,’ which have overcome ‘history’s most pernicious quandary’ and ‘most intractable problem.’
Yet this, too, is a myth that must be challenged. There is nothing normal about ethnic violence. Many people think that Africa is being torn asunder by ethnic conflicts, but studies have shown that if you randomly pick any two neighbouring ethnic groups in Africa, the likelihood that they are involved in violent conflict is infinitesimally small. In describing their five cases as exceptions, Meyer and Brysac may unintentionally be reproducing the myth that ethnic diversity is prone to violence. I would have preferred a more direct attack on the claim that ethnic diversity creates a ‘pernicious quandary,’ rather than trying to identify ‘exceptions’ to the alleged quandary.”

Race to the bottom
In a Q&A with TrustLaw, Tanzanian bishop Stephen Munga rejects the argument that increased government regulation puts a country’s mining industry at a competitive disadvantage.
“That is really one-sided thinking. Across Africa there is a big discussion on mine nationalisation. And that is coming up because we don’t see good bills. It’s not a question of who is going to have the lowest figures, it’s a question of who’s going to deliver so that local communities can benefit.
For African governments now, since they’re getting a lot of pressure from civil society, whoever comes up with a good bill, is the one who’s going to win. Otherwise, you already have about five countries that are discussing mining nationalisation.”

RIP world music
Ian Birrell writes on the Guardian’s music blog that the term “world music” has become “outdated and increasingly offensive.”
“For a start, it implies cultural superiority. Artists from America and Europe tend not to get stuck in the world section, just those that don’t speak English or come from “exotic” parts of the world. They can be consigned safely to the world music ghetto, ignored by the mainstream and drooled over by those who approach music as an offshoot of anthropology.”

Latest Developments, March 21

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White Savior Industrial Complex
Novelist Teju Cole argues that Americans should focus on reducing the negative impacts of their own government’s actions abroad before trying to “help” by intervening in Africa.
“Let us begin our activism right here: with the money-driven villainy at the heart of American foreign policy. To do this would be to give up the illusion that the sentimental need to ‘make a difference’ trumps all other considerations. What innocent heroes don’t always understand is that they play a useful role for people who have much more cynical motives. The White Savior Industrial Complex is a valve for releasing the unbearable pressures that build in a system built on pillage. We can participate in the economic destruction of Haiti over long years, but when the earthquake strikes it feels good to send $10 each to the rescue fund. I have no opposition, in principle, to such donations (I frequently make them myself), but we must do such things only with awareness of what else is involved. If we are going to interfere in the lives of others, a little due diligence is a minimum requirement.”

Silicosis suit
Reuters reports that “the biggest class action suit Africa has ever seen” is looming for South Africa’s gold mining companies as thousands of former miners with damaged lungs join a fast-growing list of plaintiffs.
“A successful suit could collectively cost mining companies such as AngloGold Ashanti, Gold Fields, Harmony and global giant AngloAmerican billions of dollars, according to legal and industry experts. The largest settlement to date by the mining industry in South Africa was $100 million in 2003 in a case brought by [Richard] Spoor against an asbestos company.
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It’s hard to estimate the potential size of a silicosis class action. South Africa is the source of 40 percent of all the gold ever mined. At its height in the 1980s the industry employed 500,000 men – two-thirds of them from Lesotho, Mozambique and the Eastern Cape – although production has fallen behind China and Australia and employment since halved. But silicosis can take years to show up and check-ups are at best haphazard. A 2005 study by the National Institute of Occupational Health in Johannesburg, based on autopsies of miners, suggested 52 in every 100 had the disease.”

World Bank options
Reuters also reports Nigerian Finance Minister Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala and former Colombian Finance Minister Jose Antonio Ocampo are set to become candidates for the World Bank presidency but the US “is still likely to ensure that another American will succeed” outgoing president Robert Zoellick.
“All of the World Bank’s 187 members nations have committed to a merit-based process to select Zoellick’s successor.
Emerging and developing economies have long talked up their desire to break U.S. and European dominance of the Bretton Woods Institutions, but have until now have failed to build a coalition large enough to change the status quo.”

Limiting patents
Intellectual Property Watch reports that the US Supreme Court has ruled against the right to patent “an invention that merely applies known technology to natural phenomena.”
“The ruling is likely to a major impact on the medical and biotech industry. Many methods of medical diagnoses and medical treatment are now unpatentable. And the ruling may kill patents on human genes – including Myriad Genetics Inc.’s controversial patent on two breast cancer genes. The Federal Circuit (America’s so-called “patent court”) recently upheld Myriad’s patent, but that ruling is now in trouble, according to many experts.”

Suspect behaviour
The Guardian reports the story of a former FBI informant who says the agency’s efforts to prevent terrorist plots too often consisted of entrapment.
“In the case of the Newburgh Four – where four men were convicted for a fake terror attack on Jewish targets in the Bronx – a confidential informant offered $250,000, a free holiday and a car to one suspect for help with the attack.
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Such actions have led Muslim civil rights groups to wonder if their communities are being unfairly targeted in a spying game that is rigged against them. Monteilh says that is exactly what happens. ‘The way the FBI conducts their operations, It is all about entrapment … I know the game, I know the dynamics of it. It’s such a joke, a real joke. There is no real hunt. It’s fixed,’ he said.”

Better but…
Human Rights Watch reports that labour conditions for migrant workers are improving at an Abu Dhabi mega-construction project that includes new branches of New York University, the Louvre and the Guggenheim, but problems remain.
“In addition, Human Rights Watch found that contractors are regularly confiscating worker passports and substituting worker contracts with less favorable ones when the workers arrive in the UAE. While the developers and institutions on Saadiyat have pledged to end these practices, and the scale of the problems Human Rights Watch documented is not as bad as in 2009, the continuation of poor practices in a number of cases reflects ongoing gaps in protection. The parties that benefit from these ventures need to make an unequivocal pledge to reimburse workers found to have paid recruitment fees in contravention of existing policies. The educational and cultural institutions and local developers also need to investigate and effectively enforce penalty provisions against contractors who disregard policies meant to protect workers from abuse.”

Lowering rents
The Centre for Economic and Policy Research’s Dean Baker takes issue with the argument that the prospect of enormous profits is necessary to drive innovation.
“The question is not whether we are better off with Steve Jobs getting very rich and all the products that Apple developed, or having Steve Jobs be poor and not having these products; the question is whether it was necessary for Jobs to get quite so rich in order to get these products.
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Suppose we paid for the research and development of prescription drugs upfront rather than by giving drug companies patent monopolies. As a result of these monopolies, drugs that would sell for $5 per prescription in a free market sell for hundreds or even thousands of dollars. The savings from this switch could potentially save us more than $200bn a year and provide us with better health care.”