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Post a Comment On: Steve Sailer: iSteve

"Samuelson on "Farewell to Alms""

8 Comments -

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Anonymous Fred said...

There has also been some positive news for Africa in the just-announced Chinese deals with large local banks in Nigeria and South Africa; as the head of the Nigerian bank said in the FT today, he'd now have virtually unlimited amounts of capital to draw on for infrastructure projects. Obviously, the Chinese are motivated by self-interest in buttering up the countries that provide them natural resources, but this could be a win-win for both.

11/1/07, 12:01 AM

Anonymous Mark said...

A few problems:

1) It wouldn't seem there are enough natural resources to put all the people to work, and the African economy is all about natural resources.

2) Manual labor is fighting an uphill battle. Smart technology is king. It will only get worse for people whose primary asset is a strong back.

3) Corruption ruins everything. If 1% of Europeans are noticably corrupt, but 10% of Africans are, that still means that 90% of Africans are honest, decent people - and that crime is 10 times higher.

4)Communication is important, but transportation is fundamental. People in South Africa started tearing up the street cars when they realized they could sell the scrap for money. Presto - no street cars! Corruption inhibits the ability to simply get around.

What's happening in Africa is evolution before our eyes. A population has been presented with a fate accompli - advanced civilization - and has been told, by nature, to adapt or die. So many are dying, just as so many of our own predecesors did who couldn't cut the mustard.

AIDs appears to be one way it's happening. It's targetting the horniest, most impulsive, most superstitious members of the bunch, and at a very high rate.

11/1/07, 2:03 AM

Anonymous beowulf said...

"as the head of the Nigerian bank said in the FT today, he'd now have virtually unlimited amounts of capital to draw on for infrastructure projects."

Why do I have a funny feeling this will only lead to a further rise in the London real estate market?

11/1/07, 7:52 AM

Anonymous TH said...

The proliferation of computers and internet access in Africa could also cut the spread of HIV, as African guys will spend their time surfing for porn instead of doing it the old fashioned way :)

Pupils browse porn on donated laptops

11/1/07, 8:30 AM

Anonymous Anonymous said...

Bah. If you asked American feminists they'd tell you they do 80% of the work here too.

11/1/07, 7:41 PM

Anonymous Evil Neocon said...

Good point Steve except getting African men to stop polygyny and the "Big Man" culture will take heroic effort over many decades.

Women don't like it in Africa but they put up with it. It would take (just guessing) either a century-sustained missionary type cultural effort by well funded outside sources or Stalinesque central government that actually functioned to remake African men. I think it can be done, should be done, must be done, but I'm not optimistic about changing the culture of African Men towards more European/Japanese style deferred pleasure, cooperation over Big Man style thuggery, and the like.

11/1/07, 9:16 PM

Anonymous Grizzlie Antagonist said...

***** By one estimate I've seen, from an African feminist organization, women do 80% of the work in sub-Saharan Africa. That's probably biased, so let's say it's only 70%. So, if the men started working as hard as the women, and were on average as productive, that would boost output by 40%. *****


"As productive"? If we're talking about physically intense labor, presumably, the men would be considerably more productive.

But I'm skeptical about those gender studies which show that men on this planet -- especially in the Third World -- don't do any work, yet somehow control all of the wealth.

That scenario has always struck me as an academically respectable version of "the Jewish banker conspiracy".

I could be wrong, but I suspect that in Africa, it's the men who are the invisible labor force.

11/1/07, 9:44 PM

Anonymous Anonymous said...

Are the gender/work roles for native Sub-Saharan Africans similar to African communities abroad?

In the US there is a similar story of African-American women achieving more than their men in terms of education, employment and incarceration even normalizing with other races for predictable gender differences. The women are also doing most of the heavy lifting in terms of raising kids (albeit often very poorly) as single parents and working jobs.

Which Sub-Saharan community outside Africa has adopted best to the world at large? Jamaica? UK?

11/2/07, 9:58 AM

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