How much would I have to donate to charity annually to raise the typical citizen of a third-world-nation to a decent standard of living?
Obviously, a complex question:
wealth/income varies widely between countries designated as belonging to third world
definition of 3rd world status not well delineated
cost of living differs widely
“decent standard of living” could vary in definition; I’m not thinking “American” level (there aren’t enough resources in the world to achieve that), but I am thinking, at least, “not in poverty”–i.e., sufficient food, clean water, education, employment, housing
efficiency of charity system is certainly never going to be 100%
A major problem with this is that much of what makes the first world rich is institutional–rule of law, property rights, infrastructure, etc. No amount of money given to a single individual will get him a good road system, or constant electricity (I guess he could buy a backup generator tho), or the ability to start a small business without filling out five reams of paperwork and bribing twelve different officials.
But putting that aside, you might want to check out the concept of purchasing power parity (PPP), which measures how much your money actually gets you, as opposed to its official exchange rate. No one in the U.S. could buy adequate food for <$1/day, but it’s quite possible in many parts of the world. To take an example from a random 3rd world county, Rwanda’s official GDP is 1.968 billion, but its PPP GDP is 13.54 billion, which suggests that $2 given to an average Rwandan will actually buy him $13.5 worth of stuff. This might be helpful in figuring out how much your charity dollar is actually helping.
Depends on your definition of “adequate”. A person could probably survive on a few packets of Ramen noodles a day, though probably not thrive. But then, the folks in third world countries surviving on a dollar or less a day aren’t generally thriving, either.
But a subsistance farmer or hunter/gatherer doesn’t show up in any economic statistics. If you grow vegetables and tend chickens next to your hut you might never touch currency during a typical year, and yet not be starving.
The effect of injecting money into a third world economy is going to raise prices for everyone as you have increased currency chasing a fixed amount of goods and sevices. You may not end up doing as much good as you think you are.
Sorry–I wasn’t clear. I didn’t actually plan to mail a check to someone in Sub-Saharan Africa. I was thinking more along the lines of, as a rule of thumb, how much money would I have to give to your typical charity to equal the amount of money that would raise a single person to a decent standard of living. Just as a sort of mental benchmark for the donor. I’m presuming that the cash would actually be spread among many people–used to purchase medicines, emergency food aid, build schools, pay teachers, educate people about sanitation, develop clean water sources, etc.
When I was in East Africa a local complained to me that one of the few commercial enterprises performing well in the Mombassa area ,a factory producing clothing of various sorts went out of business in a very short time when enthusiastic Western tourists jumped on the bandwagon of taking second hand clothing with them on holiday to give away.
Another gripe was Westerners going to E Africa to teach young children their ABCs and other basics .
"Do they think that we havent got anyone capable of teaching our kids the alphabet and the “Times Tables?”
When I asked them why they didnt say something about it to the aid workers they confessed to being scared of offending the charities if they did so and having their financial assistance reduced.
It is true that some of the "dogooders"that are out there ,are there more for their own personal “feel good about themselves factor” then any real concern for the locals plus it doesnt do them any harm having a half saint,half Indiana Jones image when theyre back home telling an admiring audience of friends and family about all their good works.
From what Ive seen unsentimental pragmatists achieve a hell of a lot more then many of the amateurish well wishers .
If the money isnt used intelligently you might just as well flush your donation down the toilet .
A very .very rough rule of thumb is to choose charities that do not have a particulary slick ad. campaign and where the people you talk to do not gush !and do not look on it as a great adventure but just a long hard slog.
But thats my opinion only.