Poverty incorporated has probably been one of the most eye-opening documentaries I think we've watched. It made me think back to the McDonald's monopoly Scandal where everyone thought things were normal and that nothing is out of the ordinary but there’s a bigger scheme behind what's shown. In the case of Poverty Inc, it stopped me to think that providing aid to a country actually stops it from developing, that the very thing we're trying to help actually hinders. The worst part being that we know what we are doing. The one gentleman who was being interviewed made a pretty good point when he said “what country has been built off of aid? countries develop through trade.” He has a very good point if you keep giving people things for free there's no incentive to find it on your own or to create your own version of it. I feel like this is a point that can be cross applied to a lot of the free-market ideas we've discussed this semester so far. That it's good to help when it is necessary but it's up to you to make something of yourself.
I'm not saying that humanitarian aid isn't a good thing, but you can definitely tell how it is being abused by controlling developing countries and keeping them poor by not allowing their markets to establish and compete with foreign free things. I thought the neatest part was the whole rice example which stated that western farmers are being subsidized to grow a surplus of rice that way we could give it to Haiti. This was the case for other Western countries as well and this is counterproductive because it made farmers in Haiti have to compete with free American rice. Anyone who's ever tried to start a business around anything knows that it's hard to compete with something that is free to come by. Another very important piece that I found was the World Bank situation where developing countries could take a loan if they needed to, but they are essentially stuck having to pay them back. This creates an endless cycle where Third World countries can never get out of being a Third World country because they're being forcefully pushed out of competing economically.
Africa, I think, is the best example of this because it is so rich in natural resources, but it is seen as one of the most third world countries by size. This is because we aid Africa by giving them free stuff to help but what we've actually done is not allowed African countries to develop through international trade. To be able to stand on their own so that creates a dependency on foreign aid. much like there's many people in the US that rely on federal aid to be able to maintain a living, so you create generations of people who've become dependent on being given things instead of going and earning them. Back to the monopoly scandal, at least then McDonald's didn't know about what was going on but here as a globe and charitable organizations we know exactly what we're doing by directly pushing developing nations out of a chance to compete on a global market. So, we're not helping them at all, in fact we're making things much worse off for them.
Another example that was used in the documentary that I liked was where one gentleman who was interviewed said that “aid should be in times of crisis and when there's still aid three years later there's problems”. This documentary really made me think about the motives that the US and developed nations have in terms of foreign affairs and in helping other nations. like even a current example with the wars going on in the Middle East and in Ukraine that for most of the public it seems that we are in the best interest for the people there and of the world. We’re actually doing nothing but making the situation worse by adding fuel to the fire by directly funding military operations. This is something that I don't think a lot of people realize in that this is how the world works. That it's easy to make something sound good, that it is intended for good but that is being utilized incorrectly to oppress the people. I hope that eventually we can see a shift from false incentives and start caring about developing countries and giving them an opportunity to make a foothold in the global trade market.
