No I don’t.

i am not the only one who thinks like that:

http://www.denverpost.com/harsanyi/ci_13501105

He is more eloquent than me, but he says exactly the same, but one day later.

At cafe hayek Prof. Boudreaux wrote: harsanyi hit a home run!

You seem not to believe in science nor in public policy. 500 years of economic development undermines that belief!

The only poverty expert I respect, is that person who actually starts a business in a poor country, trades, makes a profit, expands, employs more and more people in a productive way and actually makes the pie in the country bigger.

But a civil servant, reading newspapers and spreadsheets, designing plans and enjoying his rich life as a parasite of poverty, I can not respect as an expert of the poor.

Faced with all these perceived “impossibilities,” Easterly and Freschi would apparently prefer to wait and see rather than take action when it is needed, based on the information available at the time. Forecasting is impossible in their eyes. What then is possible? The crisis will probably be over before we will no longer need to make forecasts or estimates to fill in for missing data. Counterfactual analysis of the impact of a crisis is also deemed to be “impossible,” even though the pre-crisis expectations for growth in developing countries are a matter of public record—hardly impossible to know! My Economix article last week defended forecasting against this type of analytic paralysis in the face of uncertainty.

Easterly and Freschi also suggest that the numbers coming from the international agencies are a muddle. Granted there are differences, but Easterly and Freschi have manufactured a good deal of the perceived muddle by mixing forecasts of different things made at different times (and hence with different information). As they could have readily verified, the 89 million figure quoted in the World Bank’s G20 paper is the estimated impact of the crisis on the number of people living below $1.25 a day by the end of 2010 based on our latest growth forecasts, as of mid 2009. “Impact” is assessed relative to the pre-crisis trajectories, as expected at the beginning of 2008.

The uncertainty about these numbers is, of course, acknowledged. But they appear to be the best estimates we can currently make given the information available.

- Zoellick speech on the eve of Istanbul: Current upheaval = French revolution, Africa’s growth potential = Europe’s with Marshall Plan. Earth-shaking changes: “Bretton Woods is being overhauled before our eyes.” – Impartial observers like Nancy Birds…

What is needed is these organizations to have more power (more resources). They have to be supported by the constituent states (not undermined), and allowed them to be supra-national agencies.

Anything in life is like a mosaic, the empty spaces are as important as the fill in spaces- in aid and development as well- we (IO, BO, rich countries and rich people) are obsessed with poverty may be because we are so rich so we think we have to count the poor, and when the numbers go up, we become anxious – why don’t we count successes in Africa and elsewhere? Why don’t we count positive indicators instead and see if they go up or down- it could stimulates a positive energy instead of a depressing one and will show Africa in a different light. Africa is way more than Aids, poverty, and corruption; it is a place where you can find entrepreneurs and strong women, etc. They are heroes of modern myths and their stories could nourish our collective unconsciousness. It is by blowing gently on a spark that we make a fire, it is by adding yeast and letting it doing its work that we raised the bread, etc; in the same way by providing (also) data of positive indicators (among other positive actions) could provide”the dynamic poor” the psychological little blow they need to keep their spark alive.

Thank you.

Also re comment by Mukhtar Amin about the Guardian (UK)..there was also this today that, given the interest in poverty in the ‘developing world’ I thought was interesting. (title of piece: A new report claims the media is to blame for the UK public’s lack of concern over poverty in their own country” http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2009/sep/28/dispatches-media-uk-charities-poverty

(one part says this – “Searching for an answer to why there isn’t much popular concern over UK poverty, the Joseph Rowntree Foundation (JRF), in a report published last week, places much of the blame on the media, saying there is little appetite to address themes of poverty. In newspapers, the subject is “worthy, not newsworthy”, and journalists found it was often “difficult to give poverty a focus, since it is ongoing and amorphous rather than a specific ‘event’”.) Which is interesting as clearly poverty is not what interests people but the idea of it affecting non-western people (the whole the ‘other’/edward said factor (I suppose not much a surprise but thought it was mildly interesting!)

Also, I agree with much of the post and can see where you’re going with this -

“Unfortunately, the made-up poverty numbers look positively respectable compared to other claims in the UN Voices of the Vulnerable that are based on no known statistics whatsoever:

“Women and children are likely to bear the brunt of the crisis…depression and drug and alcohol abuse could be on the rise….{including} consumption of strong local brews….{There are} rises in domestic violence…{There are} increased social tensions within communities.”

But, surely, using what we do know about vulberable members of society (esp factoring in poverty/conflict) this is not that unlikely to occur? In Canada the rise of alcoholism amongst native canadians is absolutely a factor of poverty and India (where my experience lies) I would say, without question women and children are usually the worst affected when times are hard. I don’t have first-hand working expereince in Africa, but my brother who has been in Sudan (UN) for some years now (and fyi, after 10 years working in various countries with the UN would agree with 99% of your views about the UN!) also says woman and children are usually the wordt affected – and, of course, clearly lack of resources are a major source of conflict.

Perhaps I’m missing something and took your post too literally? (I have been up with two under-3’s most of the night so can’t claim to be that sharp right now!) But using my scant knowledge of economics (Occam’s razor) – surely we don’t need precise numbers…indeed isn’t that your point in some respects… to come to some conclusions about who might be most affected during times of poverty/conflict?

There is a fourth option that Mr. Easterly talked about. Limit statistical predictions to those which there is good data for. In other words, show a little restraint.

1) give up entirely on collecting reliable and valid data on poverty and making projections, due to the inherent difficulty.

2) continue with the current system.

3) fund something live GIVAS or existing statistics authorities to do a better job.

I would opt for # 3 in hopes of improving the current system. But then I guesss Easterly would say the solution is in the incentive system for statisticians and international bureaucrats. But do we fire them if their predictions/estimates aren’t correct?