sexta-feira, outubro 29, 2021

"Perfect markets are for the poor"

Continuo a leitura de "How Rich Countries Got Rich and Why Poor Countries Stay Poor" de Erik S. Reinert

"Europeans observed early on that generalized wealth was found only in areas where agriculture was absent or only played a marginal role, and came to be seen as an unintended by-product when many diverse branches of manufacturing were brought together in large cities. Once these mechanisms were understood, wise economic policy could spread wealth outside these few 'naturally wealthy' areas. Policies of emulation could, indeed, also spread wealth to formerly poor and feudal agricultural areas, but they involved massive market interventions. For laggard nations market interventions and wise economic policies could substitute for the natural and geographical advantages that produced the first wealthy states. We can further imagine that export taxes on raw materials and import taxes on finished products were originally means for raising revenues in poor nations, but that a by-product of these measures was to increase wealth through the growth of domestic manufacturing capacity. [Moi ici: Há aqui qualquer coisa que julgo ser verdade no que Reinert escreve acerca da origem da riqueza. No entanto, torço o nariz à solução que ele propõe, pelo menos para Portugal. A Irlanda deu o salto com uma intervenção estatal longe de "export taxes on raw materials and import taxes on finished products". Um país sem capital e sem experiência não pode voar, só trepar. A única forma de voar é atrair capital e know-how]

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Thus rivalry, war and emulation in Europe created a dynamic system of imperfect competition and increasing returns. New knowledge and innovations spread in the economy as increased profits and increased wages, and as larger bases for government taxation. European economic policy was based for centuries on the conviction that the introduction of a manufacturing sector would solve the fundamental economic problems of the time, creating much-needed employment, profits, higher wages, a larger tax base and a better circulation of the currency. ... Standard textbook economics which seeks to understand economic development in terms of frictionless `perfect markets' totally misses the point. Perfect markets are for the poor. It is equally futile to try to understand this development in terms of what economists refer to as `market failure'. Compared to textbook economics, economic development is a giant failure of perfect markets."

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