Eat the Rich (Kill the Poor)

Beyond the question of why some nations are living the high life (relatively) while others are subsisting on less than a dollar a day, there remains a strange disparity between first-world nations and the "in-betweeners"-- nations that are not desperately poor, but are not exactly enjoying the standards of living of the U.S., England, various Scandinavian countries, etc. Many Central and South American nations and former Soviet states fall into this category. Humorist/journalist/Cato Institute guy P.J. O'Rourke explores this less-vast but still intriguing disparity in 1998's Eat the Rich in way that makes the economics of wealth distribution far funnier than it was intended to be. His thesis (or rather mission statement):

"I decided that if I wanted to know why some places were rich and other places were poor, I should go to those places. I would visit different economic systems: free market, socialist, and systems nobody could figure out. I'd look at economically successful societies: the U.S., Sweden, Hong Kong. I'd look at economically unsuccessful societies: Albania, Cuba, Tanzania. And I'd look at societies that hadn't decided whether to be successful or not: Russia and mainland China. I'd wander around, gape at things, and simply ask people, 'Why are you so broke?' Or 'How come you're shitting in high cotton?'"

Arguably this is actually a more in-depth approach than is taken by many accredited theoretical economists (one of whom, a one M. Friedman, we'll be examining soon. And before you ask yourself "Aren't you trying to solve poverty here? What's with all these conservatives?," I should tell you that I am merely trying to figure out how the free market worked so well to make us really rich, until it ran into its recent problems). By visiting these various places, O'Rourke is able to communicate a cultural aspect that goes hand in hand with the types of economies he's examining, rather that simply saying "The best system to create a high standard of living for all is [capitalism/socialism/mixed economy/something else, God forbid] because of this [graph/principle/equation/vague historical example]."

He starts with the States, in a chapter called Good Capitalism, and discusses as reasons for our economy's success a lot of the practices that have been recently discredited as responsible for the "great recession." Ah, the innocence of the late '90s. One segment sums it up:

"'We're rich!' I told my wife. 'Get a Range Rover and a pasta machine!'
'We're poor!' I yelled. 'Sell the dog.'
'We're rich again!'
'We're poor.'
'We're really poor.'
'Rich! Rich!'
'Poor! Poor!'"

To have the luxury of a market where one can take outlandish financial risks that cause bouts of shouting like the one above without having anyone raise their eyebrows is representative of just how far ahead the U.S. economy is of everyone else. Under certain interpretations, anyways. The Swedish might beg to differ. In the chapter Good Socialism, O'Rourke discusses the Swedish as a people evolved beyond such petty complaints as exorbitant tax rates-- willing to give up large quantities of their income earned in a now largely-private economy to the government in exchange for top-notch education, healthcare, and other social services. And why not? Swedes get five weeks of legally mandated paid vacation. Parental leave is 450 days at 80% pay. Education is free-- through the PhD level. Life expectancy: 78.2 years. Infant mortality: 4.5 per 1,000. There are no Swedish robber barons, but everyone is pretty much set. There isn't even war.

O'Rourke goes through the flaws of each system, but they're not worth mentioning. (Besides, this isn't Sweden. Buy the damn book yourself.) More relevant is how they stack up to their Bad Capitalism and Bad Socialism counterparts: Albania and Cuba. Here are two countries that, unlike our previous examples of Haiti and most of sub-Saharan Africa, have reasonably identifiable economic systems. They're just really bad. How bad, you ask, and why? Tune in next time to find out.