Global Wealth and Poverty
Authors on striving to explain the wealth distribution among the poor and the rich in low-income nations apply various perspectives (A p 306). An illustration of a developing country, in this case, in the Philippines. The state features a significant proportion of its citizens living beyond the poverty scale. Ann explains that these poor people work to contribute to the economic development of their country (300). Despite their efforts in their country’s economic development, they bear the burden of poverty. Manilla in the Philippines has high population growth, poor economic productivity, and generally poor quality of life (A p 307). Various economic theories apply to understand the wealth and poverty distribution in the Philippines and other countries in the world. As such, this essay focuses on the factors contributing to global wealth and poverty distribution.
Primarily, development and population size influence the quality of life. The two factors affect the GDP and, consequently, per capita income (A p 307). This is from the sense that economic productivity is lowest in areas with higher population growth; thus, revenue generated to sustain life is more economical as the case of a developing country. Economic development determines the extent of wealth relating to GDP, where the world’s wealthiest nations are more productive than emerging nations. It is worth noting that GDP integrates the value of goods and services a country can generate in a given financial year. Also, per capita GDP measures the average living standards in a given state. Therefore, GDP reflects concern on income levels, health standards, and existing inequalities.
Apart from GDP, education and longevity influence an individual’s quality of life. Education integrates the level of adult illiteracy and time spent schooling. On the contrary, longevity refers to the time –span of an individual’s existence. The authors argued in 2006, Norwegians had the highest quality of life registered compared to Niger (A p 307). The author further argues that the distinction between absolute and relative poverty is the inadequacy of resources taken for granted and resources deemed life-threatening, such as nutrition for health. In that case, emerging countries feature absolute poverty.
Additionally, modernization and dependency theory assist in explaining economic development. Nohlen describe modernization theory as an economic and social development model explaining global inequality in technology and cultural distinction. However, the dependency theory explains global disparities relative to the terms of the historical exploitation of developing nations by rich nations (81). Looking at the Rostow’s stages of development including traditional, technological maturity, take off, and mass consumption stage explain how people use their talents and skills to spur economic and embracing of technology by industries, thereby improving the people’s living standards. According to Skocpol, Wallerstein’s model of the capitalist world suggest that the prosperity of economic dependency is a result of the global financial system (1075). Lappe and Collins contribute to a vicious cycle in that corporation of the rich and emerging countries to grow and export profitable crops such as coffee, which means using land that could otherwise produce essential such as beans and maize for locals. In addition to this, the government supports this practice (99).
Most people around the world are better off than ever before in absolute terms means that modernization has led to improved living standards among the less developed countries because they export goods to developed countries. Generally, global wealth and poverty can result in differences between the rich and the poor due to the widening of the poverty gap and thus can lead to conflict between nations.
Works cited
Clausen, Anne. “Economic globalization and regional disparities in the Philippines.” Singapore Journal of Tropical Geography 31.3 (2010): 299-316.
Nohlen, Dieter. “Modernization and dependence.” Intereconomics 15.2 (1980): 81-86.
Lappe, Frances Moore, and Joseph Collins. “Why Can’t People Feed Themselves?.” Food First: Beyond the Myth of Scarcity (1977): 99-111.
Rostwow.W.W. the stages of economic growth. The Economic History Review, New Series, Vol. 12, No. 1 (1959), pp. 1-16.Published by: Blackwell Publishing on behalf of the Economic History Society http://www.jstor.org/stable/2591077
Skocpol, Theda. “Wallerstein’s world capitalist system: a theoretical and historical critique.” (1977): 1075-1090