Does the following sounds like a joke to you? I mean, does passages like "I've always thought that under-populated countries in Africa are vastly UNDER-polluted, their air quality is probably vastly inefficiently low compared to Los Angeles or Mexico City" seem a joke?
And if it's a joke, what is the punchline?
DATE: December 12, 1991
TO: Distribution
FR: Lawrence H. Summers
Subject: GEP
'Dirty' Industries: Just between you and me, shouldn't the World Bank be encouraging MORE migration of the dirty industries to the LDCs [Least Developed Countries]? I can think of three reasons:
1) The measurements of the costs of health impairing pollution depends on the foregone earnings from increased morbidity and mortality. From this point of view a given amount of health impairing pollution should be done in the country with the lowest cost, which will be the country with the lowest wages. I think the economic logic behind dumping a load of toxic waste in the lowest wage country is impeccable and we should face up to that.
2) The costs of pollution are likely to be non-linear as the initial increments of pollution probably have very low cost. I've always thought that under-populated countries in Africa are vastly UNDER-polluted, their air quality is probably vastly inefficiently low compared to Los Angeles or Mexico City. Only the lamentable facts that so much pollution is generated by non-tradable industries (transport, electrical generation) and that the unit transport costs of solid waste are so high prevent world welfare enhancing trade in air pollution and waste.
3) The demand for a clean environment for aesthetic and health reasons is likely to have very high income elasticity. The concern over an agent that causes a one in a million change in the odds of prostrate[sic] cancer is obviously going to be much higher in a country where people survive to get prostrate[sic] cancer than in a country where under 5 mortality is 200 per thousand. Also, much of the concern over industrial atmosphere discharge is about visibility impairing particulates. These discharges may have very little direct health impact. Clearly trade in goods that embody aesthetic pollution concerns could be welfare enhancing. While production is mobile the consumption of pretty air is a non-tradable.
The problem with the arguments against all of these proposals for more pollution in LDCs (intrinsic rights to certain goods, moral reasons, social concerns, lack of adequate markets, etc.) could be turned around and used more or less effectively against every Bank proposal for liberalization.
> does passages like "I've always thought that under-populated countries in Africa are vastly UNDER-polluted, their air quality is probably vastly inefficiently low compared to Los Angeles or Mexico City" seem a joke?
> what is the punchline?
It's akin to saying "This establishment's high Google/Yelp ratings indicate it's leaving money on the table. There's clearly room to raise prices, cut costs, and really degrade the customer experience."
I don't know if Summers is telling the truth about his intent. But as far as jokes go, it's decent.
“A young healthy child well nursed, is, at a year old, a most delicious nourishing and wholesome food, whether stewed, roasted, baked, or boiled; and I make no doubt that it will equally serve in a fricassee, or a ragout.”
The whole thing is the punchline. If you're missing something, read strken's response elsewhere in this thread, because he put it in a better way than I have anywhere else here - none of it is serious, and if you read it seriously, you are the other punchline:
> argumentum ad absurdum indictment of the way the "cost" of pollution is calculated.
It's not a joke. He didn't even say it was a joke. He said (as quoted on the Wikipedia page for the memo!) that it was “a comment on a research paper that was being prepared by part of my staff at the World Bank” and that it “sought to clarify the strict economic logic by using some rather inflammatory language”.
The closest it gets to being a joke is that it is mockery and derision directed at underlings as a form of feedback on work product.
Kind of what I mean. I hadn't heard of this guy before today, and this memo openly laments that it's challenging to bring Africa into the world pollution economy because moving solid waste there is a logistical challenge. If this memo was about how cool it is to traffic and rape children, as some people in this thread and a few others today seem to be interpreting it, I'd probably be less inclined to lend it the benefit of this tone, but I'm just not sold on the premise that someone who is demonstrably evil in some dimension is incapable of making honestly benign bureaucratic jokes in a presumably private context. It kind of knocks the legs out of genuine criticism if the dude can't chew bubblegum without taking flack.
Sure but in the most polite way, that's almost saying nothing at all. I just think it kneecaps any real criticism and real issues associated with this guy to go "okay that might be a joke, but it probably isn't because <legitimate evil reason>". Though I guess it encroaches on the definition of what a joke is and if it's defined by intent. If he meant it as one, but nobody took it as one, is it?
My brother in Christ, you keep tumbling yourself to see nuance where there is none. The guy is a piece of shit. Why such magnanimous effort? I suggest you take some time off.
I've mostly repeated the same perspective to people on this thread who would rather virtue signal than read what I've already written, and what I'm saying is not hard to wrap your head around unless you're the type of person to believe in caricatures as I've described above. I think they may need some time off from news, the internet, etc, if anyone.
