MIT 14.73 The Challenge of World Poverty, Spring 2011 View the complete course: ocw.mit.edu/14-73S11 Instructor: Esther Duflo License: Creative Commons BY-NC-SA More information at ocw.mit.edu/terms More courses at ocw.mit.edu
This lecture summed up: "Supply and demand is in effect in any instance where there is a finite amount of supply, and that has consequences that affect output down the line. Too little initial supply can result in a situation where you merely have subsistence and growth is unachieved, which makes escaping said loop effectively improbable".
it blows my mind that we live in an age where you can listen to a 1-12 hour lecture on any topic in the world for free, yet we are getting stupider (at least in america)
The people who are getting more stupid, are not listening to the right videos. They are preferring sexy conspiracy junk. Having access to information doesn't mean one will know how to select the information that is worth taking in.
Unfortunately, the majority of these kind of classes are now behind heavy paywalls, and no longer receiving focus. This video is a window to an different era.
We are lucky to live in the age of information, so we could listen to a brilliant Nobel prize winner for free. Also this students are so blessed that they could actually discuss and learn even more from her.
tbh i could give a fuck if someone is a prize winner of any sort, but if an individual's information is worthwhile, then that it what I am mostly impressed and influenced by. Putting people on a pedestal is exactly how we continue to make academia and important information inaccessible.
Love it, love the lecturer too. Congrats on the big prize. Shortly after they won it, I was at a Paratham event at TISS where Abhijeet spoke for an hour or so. Absolutely wonderful. I must say they lecture in sort of similar ways. Very relaxed and comfortable.
Poverty is the natural state of mankind. Wealth is built over time, just like knowledge, and the science of economics, specialization, opportunity cost, monetary system, and it is very important to delegate the violence to a state as a social contract, etc
It is actually quite good. It gives clear mathematical reasoning (but not formulas) for explaining why poverty may happen to a segment of the population, because there is an economic zone where the income they earn today is less than the income they earned tomorrow.
"where the income they earn today is less than the income they earned tomorrow" I don't get it. Everybody's income will eventually go up. Did you mean to say yesterday?
@@paladain55 i am probably dumb here but i think what's matters is worth of a money (what can you buy for it and how many) and not just income which is just a number.
51:19 I would love to this graph in relation to actual income, also broken down by geographical region. I think it would make for a great comparison cross culturally and I would love to see how this graph would vary between lower standard income regions and higher standard income regions. Would make for great insight into how opportunity affects income and vice versa. It's also interesting to bring up the proposition that you can only benefit from increased productivity from food after a certain threshold is met in excess of sustaining your physical burden, I came across an interesting point made by Jordan Peterson, that the maximum investment vs return in terms of the growth of civilization via innovation (this includes contribution to great problems like climate change, energy and agriculture) is sponsoring nutrition in developing infants and adolescents. This is because malnutrition in developing children is a negative predictor of intelligence and consequently, an increase in intelligence (also coupled with the fact that sponsoring nutrition alleviates a major burden of impoverishment) in the global population would inevitably lead to useful innovation. Imagine if, for a whole generation, every child (20 and younger) on the planet was fed a proper amount. It's also interesting how large a role nutrition actually plays in the overall development of a country, and how lack of early childhood nutrition plays a huge role in perpetuating generational poverty and stunting the technological growth of a civilization and once these needs are met, the explosion in technological advancement and innovation.
haven't watched yet but does it comment on culture? Because culture is bigger than economics. The poor of India are not poor for the same reasons as the poor in America. The poor in America aren';t even poor for the same reasons other poor in America are, lol. I ask because there's this really dangerous and weird materialist, reductionist spin on poverty today - that usually ignores culture.
@@aristideregnier4883 It doesn't really address culture, I feel like these days it would be too inappropriate to address culture because of rampant political correctness and censorship. It's a shame though, I'd love to hear a lecture tackling such a topic.
@@skellymon1771 I agree. Listening to Cardi B. and buying Lebron James' Nikes made by Islamic prisoners in Chinese concentration camps with welfare will leave you in the poverty loop.
In 1:07:40 she describes that two feedback loop is not sufficient for poverty trap. Later on as a support, she states that if the double feedback loop gives a nice L shape eventually everybody will end up in the same place. Question: I don't thing the second sentence support the first sentence can anytbody explain am I missing something? -If the double feedback loop, doesn't create an L shape and -Not having L shape doesn't imply there 's no poverty trap curve. -Not having L shape doesn't nessasarly imply there's poverty trap curve, although it necessary. Therefore, the double feedback loop doesn't create an L shape curve doesn't state anything certain about existence of poverty trap.
- The "L shape" curve means there is no poverty trap, because it has only one stable point. The "S" shape curve which intersects the 45deg line in multiple points (and any other curve with multiple stable states) defines a poverty trap. - The double feedback loop is not sufficient to create a poverty trap. You can even get an "S shaped" curve, but if it's entirely above the 45deg line, it won't have a multiple stable states.
What I understood she said was that a "dirac" (sudden jump from 0 to another value and then flat) is an L shape if it happens at x=0 and is a "special" S if it happens later than X=0
@@jclheriteau What? No "dirac", but "double". Double feedback loop. If you have less education, you are getting less money (first feedback) and you won't have money for your kids education (second feedback). It's a concept which is also called vicious cycle. If you are at a state, which is causing something that will end up even worsening your initial situation, you can end up in a situation from which it is extremely hard to get (poverty trap). Btw, where did you get that x=0 from? There is no x and nothing is 0.
So, to help understand how poor Pak Solhin is,.. I'm from Indonesia, so, in the rural area where farmers lives, you can live off the land. you can find wild plants to eat, like cassava's leaf, bamboo shoots, palm shoots, "kangkung" leaf, Fern leaf, wild snail/clams, fish. Pak Solhin is soo poor, he couldn't even afford a bowl of plain rice / salt and Pak Solhin case is quite common in the rural areas.
Thank you for your insights! I'm from an underdeveloped country as well, but this level of poverty is extreme. I thought Indonesia wasn't that poor. What's the role of the government in all this?
@@rusty_grove ever since we have Jokowi, we have what we call rural development funds, these funds are used to develop better infrastructure in the rural area. Government also give out lands to farmer to develop in rural areas.
This is the kind of expansive thinking that more students should be exposed to. They are young and not as worldly as they think they are. A little insight into the reality of the world may help them to make economic and political decisions in the future that might actually improve life for all.
The Keynesian she showed along with Dr. Abhijit Banerjee,a huge help to me at least not by being at office I find infitesimal growth in my Economical attributes.
Every few years there is an economic collapse, then elections show up and they are discussed a few years after that. After a decade, those events will be placed on one year or event and not the leading factors.
You are correct I have done my suffering being HL but I didn't have the information as I do today. I was too afraid then to dumpster dive or try to live off the land. I have no intention of doing all of it I will try some things. For instance I wish to have a room that can survive a tornado and I would like to see if I could live off grid in this structure. I have no desire to suffer anymore than I already have in life. When I was 19 I was 145 at this height never again.
Around 27:23 I believe there is a mistake.. she is saying that if the cost of food increases, then the work capacity curve shifts down. I don't get why. The work capacity curve is barely a physiological curve dictated by one's biology. There is no way ot moving that curve up or down other than training to maybe be able to work more when in better shape. So the curve cannot move up or down for reasons other than biology. When prices go up, with the same income one can afford less food, and therefore will be on an earlier point in the X-axis compared to a situation where prices are lower and other conditions being the same. So I believe that cost of food only shrinks or expand that curve along the X-axis, but won't move the curve up or down. Reasoning with an extreme example, if cost of food goes to zero, then all the curve that we currently see in the example would be condensed on the 0 X value. And that still wouldn't move the curve up or down at all. In the same way, if food prices went to infinity, the curve would expand so much that we would never be able to move from the state of bare survival, no matter our income level. And the work capacity would still not move up or down, but it would be infinitely stretched to the right.
Much of this is about how much energy a person has at his/her command. Everyday. Any its never “free.” Someone needs to work for it. “Work” as in the physics definition of work. Maybe …. I dunno …. We are what we are.
I am posting a video with a link to this HOMELESS article can aid with poverty in America this is a very candid article written by somebody that has been homeless for extended periods. Craigslist Joe is a movie worth watching this man took a leap of faith and traveled by craigslist postings. It can happen I have hichhiked as a youth it can be done there is danger in this but again nothing is a guarantee.
In response to the troubling anecdote of Pak Solhin explained through the typed information found at 14:15, I believe that a potential solution to his issues of not having enough food to create energy within himself to work full days either as a construction worker or a hired farmer could be to better utilize the potential of his family’s land. Although I recognize that he had 12 siblings at the time of the division of their family’s land, I believe that their land could have been used differently so that they could each have a home in as little as one building that could be multiple stories above or below ground-level if it is needed. If they use a smaller portion of their land for residential purposes, while they use another portion of their land to grow food on, their family could sell the excess space in their home(s) as rent to those without shelter, sell the excess food to those who are hungry, and use the excess land for whatever else they believe they need. With this opportunity, Pak Solhin could solve his issues of hunger, inability to work, as well as gain the opportunity to teach others through his own experiences.
@@AdrienBurg Social issues are universal in the sense that nobody is completely alone. Humans naturally have “issues” but when there are more than one of us, this issue becomes social.
I don't understand why she says that with the L shape there is no poverty trap if after all it is a steady equilibrium beyond which growth does not happen?
The L shape is as a result complements, where more consumption of a good won't make you better off as the optimal units are fixed.(fertilizer with precise water and temperature requirements)
I appreciate MIT has placed coursework online but I have to say education is not the main factor. The absolute main factor is WHAT YOU DO WITH WHAT YOU HAVE. Sure an education probably will get you in a position to get a loan but that too can be a trap. Businessmen like to get a warm fuzzy feeling but honestly nothing is a guarantee there is plenty that can happen to cause a negative outcome. Education is great but to spend a lot of money on it is just not required anymore.
"Guarantees" are not the issue; probabilities are the issue. And if you think a person has the same chance of success with an education as without, you need an education.
It’s the aspect of people not knowing of opportunities that are offered due to the fact their social circles are equally limited and isolated. It’s a poverty of intellectual insight to other ways of being or thinking in the world, would be my assumption of how to think about mental poverty. If someone else has a improved way of thinking about this lmk bc I’m also curious too
living in a area with a lack of access to resources,that is taxed and lacks a high level of education.No property rights or free enterprise .The wealth is not left in the hands of the people,nor is it used to help the people.
I understand the concept that was being mentioned about eating, calories, leading to how much work you can do. I wonder how this graph would look like in the US. In the US with food deserts and fast food readily available. There are high calories, but not enough healthy calories leading to diseases such as diabetes, heart problems, etc. In this case, more less healthy calories does not lead to more productivity and growth.
I don't know how many times I started this video . But I can't finish this video . Because of language barrier her accents. And audio quality is not so good .I can't hear properly .
Poverty Trap: 1. Preordering EA Games such as Battlefield 2042 2. Gentlemen's clubs that charge more than $200 at the front door. 3. Preordering Call of Duty Vanguard
@@je-freenorman7787 Gold is a shiny metal that never corrodes meaning you can store it for thousands of years. It is never destroyed and we have been collecting it for as long as we can remember. That means we have a large supply of gold and the supply of gold only increases at 1.5% every year. This inflation in the supply of gold is smaller than the inflation generally seen in paper money, which is why we have seen gold outperform paper money since the inception of fiat currencies.
this is funny, just in passing through, when you take away person's right of enjoyment they actually start to show more signs of regression by the lack of activity they can attain in everyday situations, and contributing factors include just lack of education in social atmospheres including ; lack of ability to respond in negative situation's which is a modal of mental disorder
Poverty trap? Coming from a 3rd world country here’s the cycle: (Poor background)Not a HS graduate > Starts having multiple babies > new parents applying for low income jobs (due to unfinished education) and to feed multiple babies > Kids grow and have no guidance and got preggy> then back to start 1.
The second question of is it plausible that having a starving worker cant function for a full days work. Goes to show the gilded cage some people live in.
Its just a bad teaching style, the student didn't understand that she was making a point about a general principle, he thought she was extrapolating from a specific guy in rural Indonesia. In the student's understanding its a reasonable question as he sees that she's presenting data, while she knows that she's just illustrating an idea. A good teacher would have given a quick outline of the principle first to focus the student's minds. She didn't see the conceptual gap when she answered either and simply continued the explanation, comfortable in her understanding of what she was doing. To the student it must have seemed like a confusing avoidance of his question. Good teachers see their lesson occurring from the student's point of view. It's a difficult skill and takes years of practice.
I just started university and there are just ignorant peers. I understood the lecturer fine. Its about world and cultural experience. The questioner has no experience outside first world capitalism so his question was a normal question for people who live in gilded cages. Also the lecturer won a nobel prize...
@@WiseFool888 The purpose of the anecdote wasn't made clear. If you happened to guess the purpose correctly then you were lucky, the questioner simply guessed in a different direction. To him it seemed important to know whether that particular indonesian farmer was really not able to get enough food to work, because it seemed like that fact would be axiomatic for the rest of lecture. In reality it made no difference what that particular indonesian guy's situation was or if he even exists, it only matters that such a thing is practically possible. If you are simply on the other side, saying that we should believe this starving indonesian then you would have missed the point just as completely as the student asking the question. But that would be the fault of the teacher, even with her nobel.
you spoke of Indonesia.... a country rich in natural resources... but.. just like the US... and Europe, Asia and Africa.. South America... those resources are controlled by a small group of people... pretty much the same people.... the traps ... like misinformation... and the control of the most valuable resource of all... accurate information... belong to the oligarchs... that's what it is... maybe we should talk about... taxes taken by force... to pay for war we don't need or want.... the poor will always be with us... as sure as death and taxes maybe we could consider... that... in fact... it doesn't have to be like that at all??? maybe 🤔
@@RickarooCarew no, it does some folks just make different choices within the same household, let alone the world. Utopia is not meant for man, and the man that has it will become a dictator.
cows eat mainly grass. grass that grows in a pasture. cows are mostly protein. most food pricing is controlled by governments. in the US it is done through subsidies and taxation.
