POLITICS: Poverty Eradication

[Xenocrates]

Assume for the sake of this discussion that you were a minister of government in a developing country. What policies would you implement to eradicate severe poverty in one broad stroke?

Is it even possible?

Preferrably, try to outline your step-by-step process using a bulleted list (or in list form if you're not savvy on using the forum's [list] function).

Let's hear your answers and discuss.

[BlackCryptoKnight]

Assume for the sake of this discussion that you were a minister of government in a developing country. What policies would you implement to eradicate severe poverty in one broad stroke?

Is it even possible?

Preferrably, try to outline your step-by-step process using a bulleted list (or in list form if you're not savvy on using the forum's [list] function).

Let's hear your answers and discuss.

I dunno about 1 broad stroke, but for a start, I'd think that issues of integrity and corruption at all levels would have to be dealt with. Much of poverty is due to lapses in integrity of individuals and entities at all levels. As long as their are persons who are morally bankrupt and questionable integrity, there will be poverty.

So to lead by example, better controls would have to be put in place in said government to restore the integrity of its processes and offices and eliminate corruption. We would need to ensure that resources reach where they are supposed to reach. Public education on positive morals, values and attitudes would have to be going on concurrently.

I'm no politician, but I don't think any policies or grand schemes for poverty alleviation will ever work unless the fundamental issue of individual morality and integrity is addressed. If people are morally aligned to what is right, then individuals would do whatever they personally could to ensure that their brother, neighbour, fellow citizens don't go hungry or poor.

[Xenocrates]

Well ok Minister Knight. Instead of fighting a battle to end corruption, I would rather change the system itself so that corruption doesn't have much of an air for survival or to have much of an impact.

My approach would be the following:

• Drop taxes on advancing and locally lucrative industries. - Rapidly developing industries such as IT, medicine and farming would be tax free. Such companies would simply not be required to pay tax. This would boost production in those sectors, thus inviting foreign investors to my country, which would boost production per capita. This will create a large number of jobs for more people, as tax-free incentives for production cause it to balloon exponentially.
  
  
• Free Education to the Tertiary Level - This would eradicate illiteracy almost completely. This means that most of my country's citizens will have had at least a 1st degree from a local university and is thus employable. When they get out into the job world, becoming entrepreneurs or getting into one of the rapidly developing industries (mentioned above) would be fairly seamless and easy to do. The knowledge allows more people (especially poor people) to transform skills into wealth. Students pay for any education above the first degree.
  
  
• Hike Taxes on imported luxury consumer goods - This forces the development of a dependence on local production and thus knowledge retention in the country. Sure we can import new technologies, goods or services. However, so long as those technologies don't make a measurable impact on social development, they will be taxed heavily.
  
  
• Give tax breaks to Philantrophists - The more a local company gives back to the community, the greater the tax break they receive. This means that if richer investors from overseas firms come to my country and setup shop (because of the effects in point #1), they have more reason to invest in our local communities at the chance of attaining a tax break (thus realising greater profits for them). This is an excellent way to fight poverty in derelict regions of the country which haven't already been self-rectified by their own citizens acting on their free education.
  
  
• Performance Based Ministerial Jobs - Create a law that sets a pay ceiling for Government Ministers and other heads of government based on performance. The ministerial job must be a performance based one. This gives government ministers incentive to be more results oriented, which would stem most incentives for corruption. Corruption is unavoidable, but it can be stemmed.
  
  
• Fixed Term Government Incumbencies -No leader would be allowed to have more than a fixed number terms in the seat of power. They must be replaced by new incumbents regularly. This prevents stagnation in the political parties, robbing them of the time necessary to set down roots that are too unique to their parties, thus stemming (if not eliminating) the existence of political triablism and any accompanying corruption.

The basic premise of this schema is an automated self-nurturing social system - not one which relies on the honesty of it's citizenry. For as we all know, humans are dishonest by nature. This way, I believe we will not only create a significant amount of poverty alleviation for much of the country, but incentives to commit crime (out of a need for self sustenance) will be far less as prevalent as well.

I invite your comments / criticims.

[Gillion]

Assume for the sake of this discussion that you were a minister of government in a developing country. What policies would you implement to eradicate severe poverty in one broad stroke?

Reboot the system

[nester-san]

Free Education to the Tertiary Level - This would eradicate illiteracy almost completely. This means that most of my country's citizens will have had at least a 1st degree from a local university and is thus employable. When they get out into the job world, becoming entrepreneurs or getting into one of the rapidly developing industries (mentioned above) would be fairly seamless and easy to do. The knowledge allows more people (especially poor people) to transform skills into wealth. Students pay for any education above the first degree.

Not only free, but MANDATORY, either get educated or go work the fields like a mule, which is how smart you will look compared to everyone else!

[Greatis]

Not only free, but MANDATORY, either get educated or go work the fields like a mule, which is how smart you will look compared to everyone else!

nester-san I don't think you thought about what you were saying but saying it i nthat ways makes working the fields sound derogative.

[nester-san]

Sorry, did not mean it like that, but even farmers have to be educated!!
Argriculture is a valid and nesc. science!!
When I said mule, I meant grunt, unskilled, put tab A into Slot B work.

[g2cris]

@ Xeno - great points,

I think about it and see if I can ad anything constructive.

[BlackCryptoKnight]

Well ok Minister Knight. Instead of fighting a battle to end corruption, I would rather change the system itself so that corruption doesn't have much of an air for survival or to have much of an impact.

My approach would be the following:

• Drop taxes on advancing and locally lucrative industries. - Rapidly developing industries such as IT, medicine and farming would be tax free. Such companies would simply not be required to pay tax. This would boost production in those sectors, thus inviting foreign investors to my country, which would boost production per capita. This will create a large number of jobs for more people, as tax-free incentives for production cause it to balloon exponentially.
  
  
• Free Education to the Tertiary Level - This would eradicate illiteracy almost completely. This means that most of my country's citizens will have had at least a 1st degree from a local university and is thus employable. When they get out into the job world, becoming entrepreneurs or getting into one of the rapidly developing industries (mentioned above) would be fairly seamless and easy to do. The knowledge allows more people (especially poor people) to transform skills into wealth. Students pay for any education above the first degree.
  
  
• Hike Taxes on imported luxury consumer goods - This forces the development of a dependence on local production and thus knowledge retention in the country. Sure we can import new technologies, goods or services. However, so long as those technologies don't make a measurable impact on social development, they will be taxed heavily.
  
  
• Give tax breaks to Philantrophists - The more a local company gives back to the community, the greater the tax break they receive. This means that if richer investors from overseas firms come to my country and setup shop (because of the effects in point #1), they have more reason to invest in our local communities at the chance of attaining a tax break (thus realising greater profits for them). This is an excellent way to fight poverty in derelict regions of the country which haven't already been self-rectified by their own citizens acting on their free education.
  
  
• Performance Based Ministerial Jobs - Create a law that sets a pay ceiling for Government Ministers and other heads of government based on performance. The ministerial job must be a performance based one. This gives government ministers incentive to be more results oriented, which would stem most incentives for corruption. Corruption is unavoidable, but it can be stemmed.
  
  
• Fixed Term Government Incumbencies -No leader would be allowed to have more than a fixed number terms in the seat of power. They must be replaced by new incumbents regularly. This prevents stagnation in the political parties, robbing them of the time necessary to set down roots that are too unique to their parties, thus stemming (if not eliminating) the existence of political triablism and any accompanying corruption.

The basic premise of this schema is an automated self-nurturing social system - not one which relies on the honesty of it's citizenry. For as we all know, humans are dishonest by nature. This way, I believe we will not only create a significant amount of poverty alleviation for much of the country, but incentives to commit crime (out of a need for self sustenance) will be far less as prevalent as well.

I invite your comments / criticims.

Free education sounds great, but how're you going to fund it, and pay for teachers and facillitites, if people no longer have to pay, and also since you'd have dropped taxes on lucrative industries? Will the additional taxes on luxury imports be enough to compensate?

I still think that corruption would still need to be specifically addressed. Otherwise, you can't have full assurance that:

1. Everybody pays the taxes they should
2. The tax money goes where it is supposed to go and is used how it is supposed to be used.
3. Everybody is in fact benefitting from the free education policy as they should (ensuring nobody is disenfranchised).

[Xenocrates]

Free education sounds great, but how're you going to fund it, and pay for teachers and facillitites, if people no longer have to pay, and also since you'd have dropped taxes on lucrative industries? Will the additional taxes on luxury imports be enough to compensate?

- Excellent question. I was hoping you'd ask.

I'd legalize gambling, casinoes, lottery, the whole 9 yards, and zone a whole part of the country for tourism, ensuring that there are no exhorbitant entry fees that might create a barrier to entry for special interest services (eg. Hotels, Casinoes, private beaches, etc). I'd open up the country to outside casinoes to come in and set up shop. I'd add regional advertising of these facilities to the portfolio of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

Finally, to milk the cow like my personal heifer, I'd pass a law to take 25% out of every winning bid, gamble or bet made out of all these industries, and plough it back into the education fund.

Why did I remove tax from IT, medicine and Farming?

1. We are in the information age. Within the first 4 years of my incumbency, every home should have at least 1 computer with internet access. Being computer literate means being completely literate, and thus regionally marketable. Every Tom Dick and Harry in the country should be tech-savvy to some degree. We must be able to be competitive with regional countries in the IT sector - offering services to regional and international territories - at a cost! This means that the Government (and other industries) will stop paying out large sums of money to consultants overseas to get special jobs done here. In fact, we should be the ones exporting consultants to the region instead of the other way around. Furthermore, I'd encourage private sector companies and sole traders to give away PCs at significantly reduced cost, and charge premium price on bundled broad band internet access. This way, everybody would find it easy to own a pc and since the pc comes with an internet package from a local ISP, they get internet as well.
   
   
2. Farming is potentially a multi-billion dollar export industry - Every single farmer in my country should not only have tertiary level education, but they will be treated with special citizenship benefits, since their goods will not only feed the nation, but will feed Europe as well. There is a MASSIVE billion dollar export market potential for food produce to Europe. If most of my citizens are given enough reason to get rich from farming, you will see the same kinds of gravy-train houses in the deepest parts of the bushes as you see in the Kingston corporate area, built by higglers and merchants. Farmers should be in the same income bracket as lawyers and doctors. The high tax on imported genetically engineered food will prevent supermarket chains from stocking up on such goods. Our Ministry of Foreign Affairs will be tasked with the job of making these farmers famous in Europe with massive advertising campaigns. It would make us the sugar kings once again, like it was back in the days of slavery - the only difference is, white men won't own the plantations.
   
   
3. Affordable Medicare for Everyone - If we can import and resell drugs for cheap, the cost of medicine will drop - particularly if no tax is included. The tax free barrier to entry will allow companies like Glaxo-Smith-Kline and Pfizer to setup research and production facilities in our country. With our mostly tertiary level educated populous, GSK and Pfizer won't have a problem finding local scientists, pharmacologists, and university interns to staff their shop. That means that even Americans will be running to Jamaica to get healthcare because it is significantly cheaper than the HMO run system in the US. Not only will tourists flock to Jamdown because of it's natural offerings, but it would also contribute to hospital tourism as well.

Outside of these three industries (and goods related to them), every other business would pay tax as usual. There are enough people going into every sort of business today to fund the paychecks of government workers. One way or another, even if adjustments to certain tax threshholds have to be made, the key to making poverty disappear is to keep education free.

I still think that corruption would still need to be specifically addressed.

- It is impossible to completely eradicate corruption. That's a problem of human nature. In any event, corruption with respect to:

1. Everybody pays the taxes they should

- Can be rectified by passing a law that requires that every registered company be subject to mandatory government audits (inasmuch as car insurance is mandatory). I'd have a department under the Ministry of Finance which would function in the same capacity as the US Government's IRS. IRS workers would be paid on performance based commission - that ensures they get the job done.

The tax money goes where it is supposed to go and is used how it is supposed to be used.

- Solved by the above solution. Bureacracy is unavoidable in this scenario. The work has to be checked by independent private contractors.

Everybody is in fact benefitting from the free education policy as they should (ensuring nobody is disenfranchised).

- Give me a scenario as to how this might happen.