Column: End world poverty? Shop Wal-Mart?
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Other than economic growth, there is no way to double the salaries of 100 million people (and growing). After the 2004 Asian tsunami, more than one-third of Americans gave an aggregate of more than $400 million in charitable aid, an extraordinary outburst of giving by any standard. And yet there are more than 630 million rural Chinese remaining, many of whom are living on less than a dollar per day. While each would welcome a charitable dollar if we could get it to them, that charitable dollar, representing one good day's worth of income, would not do them nearly as much good as would a job in the city paying twice as much day in, day out. Charity cannot take place on an adequate scale to solve global poverty.
Despite Jeff Sachs' enthusiasm for foreign aid, Bill Easterly, in his book "White Man's Burden: Why the West's Efforts to Aid the Rest Have Done So Much Ill and So Little Good," makes a compelling case that government-to-government aid damages economies as often as it helps them. Does anyone think the World Bank raises more people out of poverty than does Wal-Mart?
What about social entrepreneurship? Ashoka, the highly regarded social entrepreneurship organization certified as among the "Best in America" charities, highlights among its hundreds of projects a worker's cooperative in Brazil that is growing rapidly:
Each member contracts individually with Coopa-Roca, but the collective meets weekly. Membership in the cooperative grew from eight members in 1982 to 16 in 2000, and has surged to 70 steady members today.
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