Immenizing the Eschatology By Making A Buck

As regular readers will know, I've been extremely dubious about the ECUSA's getting behind the U.N.'s Millenium Development Goals project as a way to the Way Jesus Would eradicate poverty and other nastiness around the world. To me, the problem with buying a chicken for some poor family in Ghana is that, although it might make us feel like we're Doing Something, it doesn't tackle the real root problems, which I believe to be systemic and to center around corrupt, insane and/or kleptomaniacal governments holding much of the world in thrall, utterly ignoring if not actively supressing such cornerstones of prosperity as basic property rights and the rule of law.

Over at Carpe Diem, Mark Perry quotes some statistics from "Doing Business in 2004: Understanding Regulation" by the World Bank's International Finance Corporation. See if you can spot the pattern:

Number of days to start a new business: Australia: 2 days
Venezuela: 141 days
Haiti: 203 days
Suriname: 694 days

Time to enforce a simple commercial contract:
Netherlands: 39 days
New Zealand: 109 days
Singapore: 120 days
India: 1420 days
Guatemala: 1459 days

Cost of enforcement for a simple commercial contract:
Austria, Canada and UK: Less than 1% of the disputed amount
Sweden: 5.9% of the disputed amount
U.S.: 7.7% of the disputed amount
Indonesia: 126.5% of the disputed amount
Congo: 157% of the disputed amount

Time to close a business and go through bankruptcy:
Ireland: 4 months
Japan: 5 months
Brazil: 4 years
India: 10 years

Translation: In places like Guatemala, Indonesia Suriname and the Congo, why the hell even bother trying?

Perry says this is a function of over-regulation, which is correct. However, what these numbers don't adequately indicate is the subjective and arbitrary way in which these processes are often carried out and the graft, corruption and cronyism endemic to them. (I have worked with foreign clients doing business with American regulatory bodies who were gob-smacked at how smooth and impartial the process was compared to their own experiences. In some cases, it was all I could do to only partially convince them that they didn't actually need to bribe anybody.)

It strikes me that those who really want to make an impact on world poverty would dedicate their energies to promoting impartial, transparent and minimal regulation that actually benefits private business (you know, the thing that actually, uh, generates wealth?).

Yips! to Tim Worstall.