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Debt ReliefThe Distribution of Worldwide Capital: 3 billion folk lives on $2/day
by:
Ofer Shoshani
Copyright 2005 Ofer Shoshani
This week the Live 8 mega-event turned our attention to the problem of poverty. We knowing that a child dies from it every three seconds. Patch we wait for the earth to finally do thing
in order to save the African kids, we should look closely at the statistics and the true extent of international poverty.
The distribution of Worldwide Capital
Half the world, nearly three billion people, lives on less than two dollars a day. 1.3 billion folk live on $1/day. The Gross Domestic Product of the 48 poorest nations, i.e. a quarter of the world’s countries, is less than the wealth of the world’s three richest folk combined. The 48 poorest countries account for less than 0.4 per cent of worldwide exports.
The richest 50 million folk in Europe and North America have the same financial gain
as 2.7 billion poor People. The combined wealth of the world’s 200 richest folk hit $1 trillion in 1999; the combined financial gain
of the 582 million folk living in the 43 least developed countries is $146 billion.
The current LIVE 8 campaign is trying to eliminate the financial obligation catastrophe: the developing earth spends $13 on financial obligation repayment for every $1 they have received in aid. The poorer the country, the more likely it is that financial obligation repayments are extracted directly from folk who neither narrowed the loans nor received any of the money. As a result of the financial obligation catastrophe, millions of children have died each year because their government couldn’t reduce economic condition levels.
For example, the lives of 1.7 million children have been needlessly lost in year 2000 because earth governments have unsuccessful
to reduce economic condition levels
We expect these poor countries to “develop”, but how can they hope to escape such a situation once
their population is in abominable physical condition? Around 790 million folk in the developing earth are still inveterately
undernourished, all but two-thirds of whom reside in Asia and the Pacific. We hear that education is the key, yet nearly a billion folk entered the Ordinal
century unable to see a book or sign their names.
In 1960, 20% of the population in the world’s richest countries had 30 times the financial gain
of the poorest 20% - in 1997, 74 times as much. An analysis of long-term trends shows the distance between the richest and poorest countries was around (Source: www.globalissues.org):
- 3 to 1 in 1820
- 11 to 1 in 1913
- 35 to 1 in 1950
- 44 to 1 in 1973
- 72 to 1 in 1992
20% of the population in the developed nations consume 86% of the world’s goods. The top fifth of the world’s folk in the richest countries enjoy 82% of the increasing
export trade and 68% of foreign direct investment - the bottom fifth has access to barely more than 1%.
Poverty is not only a problem for Third Earth countries. The United States, the wealthiest nation on Earth, has the widest gap between the rich and poor of any industrial
nation.
More on the Financial obligation Catastrophe could be found here: http://betotal.com/artman/publish/article_36.shtml
More on the Sponsor a Child programs, a way for you to save one necessary child in less than $1/day could be found here: http://betotal.com/artman/publish/index.shtml
Just about the author:
Ofer Shoshani has been working for the last 5 years as a professional journalist, writing from Spain, Colombia, Venezuela, Peru, Ecuador, USA, Israel, Asian nation & Thailand. Much of his activity could be found at http://www.betotal.com(international child support
programs), http://www.nzpassport.com(Immigration and Relocation to New Zealand) and http://www.bespanish.com(Immigration and Relocation to Spain).
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