Why is Haiti so poor? A history of quake-hit island

[Muhaha]

Re: Why is Haiti so poor? A history of quake-hit island

"Despite receiving more than $8.4 billion in foreign aid since 1980, Haiti is poorer today than it was 30 years ago."

Haiti's population also grew about 60% since 1980 and now stands around 9 million - 10 million people.

Where is all of this money going?

Politicians over there just pocket it.

[KanadaHye]

Re: Why is Haiti so poor? A history of quake-hit island

We can blame other nations for Haiti's problems all we want, and it is true major powers throughout the eras have had their hands in that country, but the ultimate blame on Haiti's problems lies on the Haitians. It is their country after all.

Just like the ultimate blame for Armenia's problems lies on Armenians.

"Despite receiving more than $8.4 billion in foreign aid since 1980, Haiti is poorer today than it was 30 years ago."

Haiti's population also grew about 60% since 1980 and now stands around 9 million - 10 million people.

Where is all of this money going?

[Muhaha]

Re: Why is Haiti so poor? A history of quake-hit island

We can blame other nations for Haiti's problems all we want, and it is true major powers throughout the eras have had their hands in that country, but the ultimate blame on Haiti's problems lies on the Haitians. It is their country after all.

Just like the ultimate blame for Armenia's problems lies on Armenians.

[KanadaHye]

Re: Why is Haiti so poor? A history of quake-hit island

Haiti’s real crisis is poverty

Haiti’s humanitarian disaster has rightfully elicited an outpouring of support from around the world. But the tragedy should also elicit outrage because the massive destruction, suffering and loss of life were largely avoidable.

Natural disasters, such as hurricanes and floods that have regularly afflicted Haiti, have plagued mankind throughout history. As the world has become wealthier, the ability to cope with such calamities has grown; annual deaths due to such disasters have declined by 96 percent since the 1920s.

Economic growth has made it possible for countries around the world, increasingly including developing nations, to mitigate damage done by “acts of God.” Growth typically brings sturdier construction, insurance schemes, better infrastructure, a more diversified economy, an improved ability to respond to emergencies, access to savings and credit, and so on. Unfortunately, growth has bypassed Haiti. Despite receiving more than $8.4 billion in foreign aid since 1980, Haiti is poorer today than it was 30 years ago.

Haiti’s poverty—80 percent of Haitians live on less than $2 per day—is especially tragic given the strong link between poverty and vulnerability to natural disasters. A study by the Belgium-based Centre for Research on the Epidemiology of Disasters looked at a recent 30-year period comparing natural disasters in the world’s 10 richest countries to those in the 10 poorest countries. The center found that the average annual number of victims per 100,000 population per rich country was 36; for the poor countries it was 2,879 even though rich countries experience the same amount of disasters.

Why is Haiti so vulnerable? Its insular economic policies and dysfunctional institutions have kept Haitians poor. While developing countries around the world have successfully implemented economic reforms and significantly increased growth by participating in globalization, Haiti has not. It ranks in the bottom half of nations listed in the Fraser Institute’s economic freedom index, and its rating has barely improved since 1980. The sustained lack of freedom goes a long way in explaining the precarious nature of Haitian’s lives.

I was able to observe as much on a visit to Haiti five years ago, not long after a popular uprising ousted autocratic President Jean Bertrand Aristide, whom Washington re-installed to power in 1990s as part of a democratic nation-building effort.

I witnessed the extreme degree of Haiti’s dysfunction. Hardly anything worked properly. Piped water delivery was unreliable or non-existent, so Haitians everywhere carried jugs or relied on water delivered by trucks. Electricity service was sporadic, so Haitians who could afford it relied on their own gasoline-powered generators; the rest went without light or used kerosene lamps. A visual inspection of the capital Port-au-Prince at night suggested that only about a third of the grid was in working order.

Public security was not only unreliable; it was dangerous. More than a couple of credible businessmen and civil society representatives recounted personal anecdotes about being kidnapped for ransom by the police. The money they paid in exchange for their freedom, they explained, went directly to Aristide. (Only nine countries in the world have more corruption, according to Transparency International). Crime was widespread, the police were considered just another armed gang, and those who could afford it hired private security.

There has been some improvement in security and foreign investment since then, but not enough to make a difference. Property rights are neither recognized nor protected by the state for the vast majority of Haitians. Bureaucratic regulations are stifling. According the World Bank, it takes 195 days and costs 228 percent of average income in legal and administrative fees just to legally start a business.

Ordinary Haitians labor heroically to survive. Peruvian economist Hernando de Soto recently calculated that 99 percent of Haitian businesses operate in the shadow economy. Prohibitively expensive formal laws push poor Haitians into the highly inefficient informal sector, limiting their potential for wealth creation.

As Haiti moves from emergency to reconstruction, calls for massive, long-term aid programs will only get louder.

The promise of aid is belied by its dismal record. Aid has helped keep Haiti poor. It has sustained poor government policies. It has led to debt, not development. The World Bank’s qualification of Haiti as a country so highly indebted that it required debt forgiveness, is an implicit admission of aid’s failure: all of Haiti’s long-term debt was due to aid and government backed development schemes.

Let’s not add to Haiti’s misfortunes by getting it back on the aid treadmill.

Instead of relying on such largesse, Haiti should use the crisis as an opportunity to unshackle its citizens by dramatically increasing their economic freedom. The key to Haitian prosperity will be the willingness and ability of Haitians themselves to implement far-reaching market reforms.

Ian Vásquez is the director of the Cato Institute’s Center for Global Liberty and Prosperity. He is a member of the Mont Pèlerin Society and a term member of the Council on Foreign Relations.

http://dailycaller.com/2010/01/21/ha...is-is-poverty/

[KanadaHye]

Re: Why is Haiti so poor? A history of quake-hit island

Why is Haiti so poor?

Just don't mention the "N" word.

Napolean?
NATO?
North America?

You couldn't possibly be implying.... nah, you wouldn't.

"Of the six largest post-Cold War, Western-led military operations, two - Somalia and Haiti - have been failures, two - Bosnia and Herzegovina and Kosovo - qualified successes, and two - Afghanistan and Iraq - remain highly problematic. In all these operations, the initial entry of Western forces, even when opposed, has always proved the least problematic aspect of the operation. In most cases, multinational forces have been at least nominally invited in. Where opposition existed, the mere threat of force, as in Haiti, or the application of air power alone, as in Kosovo, or air power in combination with friendly indigenous forces, as in Bosnia and Herzegovina and Afghanistan, has almost always been sufficient to gain entry. Only in Iraq in 2003 was substantial ground combat necessary to secure control of the territory in question."

http://www.nato.int/docu/review/2005...lish/art1.html

[bell-the-cat]

Re: Why is Haiti so poor? A history of quake-hit island

Why is Haiti so poor?

Just don't mention the "N" word.

[KanadaHye]

Re: Why is Haiti so poor? A history of quake-hit island

It was only a matter of time before EVIL Hollywood took over and tried to get in on some of the action, GASP!


http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/0..._n_431936.html

Yeah, I hear Leonardo DiCaprio has donated 1 million dollars to the Clinton Bush Haiti Fund to help with the earthquake relief. <cough> Clinton-Bush Fund, LOL.... I'm laughing so hard it hurts.

I guess he wasn't too sincere about his role in blood diamonds.

BTW, thanks for the link..... there are some great comments on there. I'll post them below.

__________________________________

So, not to sound cold - but I understand that about $350 million has been raised thus far but that the REAL problem is that there are supplies that can't get out to the people.

What assurances do donors have that this money simply won't be wasted and that it will really help the Haitians and not end up lining the pockets of a few folks?

Also, how much money is really needed for the immediate problem?

vs

Solving the real of problem of logistics for immediate relief?

And assuming that we won't be really spending over $300 million for initial relief - is any of that money going into a bank account for actually rebuilding the infrastructure?

______________________________

OIL.

http://tiny.cc/L3Dgs

"There is evidence that the United States found oil in Haiti decades ago and due to the geopolitical circumstances and big business interests of that era made the decision to keep Haitian oil in reserve for when Middle Eastern oil had dried up. "

_______________________________

As Haiti asks the world for help turning around the destruction wrought by the January 12th earthquake, the U.S. is funding destruction in Iraq and Afghanistan. President Obama is expected to ask for another $33 billion for the military budget this year, on top of the $1 trillion that has come out of U.S. taxpayers' pockets since 2001, to fund the so-called War on Terror.

In contrast, the president has pledged $100 million in aid to Haiti, amounting to not much more than the mortgage on a rich person's house.

The U.S. government has sent over 5,000 U.S. military personnel to Haiti, with the total expected to reach 10,000, as aid becomes increasingly militarized in the wake of this disaster. Some aid groups are openly complaining about the U.S. military presence: Doctors Without Borders said that five of its airplanes carrying medical equipment were turned away by the U.S. military and rerouted to the Dominican Republic. French and Mexican planes carrying medical aid were also turned back. U.S. soldiers are now patrolling the streets of Haiti, many with large weapons slung over their shoulders.

And many Haitians are suspicious of the influx of U.S. troops, claiming that the U.S. has been looking for excuses, for a long-time, to regain U.S. military control of their country.

[Muhaha]

Re: Why is Haiti so poor? A history of quake-hit island

It was only a matter of time before EVIL Hollywood took over and tried to get in on some of the action, GASP!

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/01/21/haiti-telethon-livestream_n_431936.html

[Muhaha]

Re: Why is Haiti so poor? A history of quake-hit island

That is what a military does.... you don't move troops into another part of the world for a picnic.

Nobody said it was a picnic. It's the protection of Haiti's leaders and other diplomats. The world needs them alive to make sure the entire country doesn't go back to the stone ages. That's all beside the fact that the Military is sending crucial supplies and has the only real resources required to deliver such a massive amount of aid in such a short period of time.

The Russian Foreign Minister agrees with all I've said about why the Military is needed btw.

Moscow not alarmed by U.S. troop buildup in Haiti

http://en.rian.ru/russia/20100122/157650672.html

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Friday he was not alarmed by increasing U.S. military presence in quake-hit Haiti.

Countries around the world are sending aid to the impoverished Caribbean nation, where some estimates put the number of dead as high as 200,000 people, with 3 million left without shelter following a 7.0 magnitude earthquake on January 12.

Bolivia, Brazil, Venezuela, Nicaragua and Uruguay have already expressed their concern over the U.S. troop buildup in the disaster-hit country. French ambassador to Haiti, Didier Le Bret described Port-au-Prince airport as "an annex of Washington."

The top Russian diplomat said that in such situations military presence is justified "because it is faster and more effective, and sometimes there are simply no other resources."

He did, however, express the hope that countries involved in rescue efforts "will not take advantage of this country to attain goals not related to helping the Haitian people and the Haitian state, both in the desperate need of aid."

"We call for the rescue operation in this hapless country to be carried out in strict compliance with the principles approved by the international community for such kind of situations," he said.

According to the U.S. task force commander for Haitian relief, Lt. Gen. Ken Keen, the U.S. contingent in Haiti will soon stand at some 20,000 personnel.

Are you seriously implying that the American military would allow the Russian military on Haiti?

I guess we'll have to wait and see....

[KanadaHye]

Re: Why is Haiti so poor? A history of quake-hit island

You first mentioned moving in the Military and that is what I was referring to. Nobody is using the Military to take over Haiti.

That is what a military does.... you don't move troops into another part of the world for a picnic.

Are you talking about Russians sending help to America or to places like Haiti?

If you're talking about Haiti, then you're wrong because Russia is actually sending troops. I guess the Russians want to occupy Haiti too eh? It's a giant earthquake occupation party, everyone is doing it.

Are you seriously implying that the American military would allow the Russian military on Haiti?