Showing posts with label Development Economics. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Development Economics. Show all posts

Thursday, July 18, 2019

Money Moved, Value Created



The biggest development economics story of my life is something I was never taught in any of the textbooks in high school or college. No development economist, many of whom do originate from the Global South, was able to foresee that remittance will play a much bigger role in development than foreign aid or even trade.

Aid is big, trade is much bigger, but the biggest of them is remittance. And we have to put remittance in a separate category from trade because we have still not achieved that stage in human evolution when we might realize a completely free movement of people all over the world will immediately add a few trillion dollars to the global GDP. Money moves. Goods move. But people get clamped down. That is where we are.

What is remittance? People move from poor countries not always to the richest countries. More often they move to slightly richer countries. They work the lowest-paying jobs. They save money when saving might be thought of as impossible. They pay shark rates to move money. And they send money home. This has been the greatest driver of development in the past few decades. No economist was able to foresee it.

There is enormous value created when you make it possible for people to move money. And that is elemental. That is not even banking. When you make that movement instantaneous and free, the value is so, so much larger. And the Blockchain promises to do that. The Blockchain is going to be more revolutionary than the Internet. The Internet has been the appetizer. The Blockchain is the meal.









Saturday, June 11, 2011

Seeking Head Of State Like Powers

Puyi, the last emperor of China, abdicated fro...Image via WikipediaIn seeking to create a for profit, high tech microfinance startup, in seeking to lead it as Chairperson/CEO, I seek to create head of state like powers for me that I hope to put singularly to the cause of microfinance. I am confident the technology that is the Internet is already ripe for such possibilities.

The Google/Facebook Of Microfinance
Microfinance Alone Can't Cure Poverty
Microfinance: No Substitute For Good Governance

I have said time and again, good governance is the number one factor in tackling poverty. It is not microfinance. And riding a microfinance outfit would give me a way to take close looks at governance structures around the world.

For instances, I am gripped by the street revolutions across the Arab world. Few things are as exciting to me as a democracy movement. There is no better display of people power.

The Long March Of Democracy
The Internet And The Emperors
Syria Is Being Left To The Dogs
Indiscriminate Firing By Syrian Security Forces

Monday, November 01, 2010

The Microfinance Fishing Net

"Give a man a fish and he will eat for a day. Teach a man to fish and he will eat for a lifetime.”
Microfinance is magic. It is the ultimate fishing net. Poverty is artificial. Microfinance proves that.