There was a reason, and it may be good or not depending on your perspective. The original purpose of the IMF was to regulate currency flow between countries, with America at the helm. This cemented US power, but it also made national governments more powerful than capital. This is maybe better than the world we have after 1973, where speculative capital flies in and out of a country on a banker’s whim. The World Bank was just a bank that gave out large infrastructure loans. This is perhaps a dubious purpose, since most countries could probably capitalize their own development and be safer from the effects of internal corruption (I.e. it is better to own your own debts) - but this is much better than the world bank imposing “structural adjustment” in order to secure loan repayments for New York and London.
As for me, I cut my teeth as an activist protesting the world bank and IMF - I say ditch them both. Still, the end of Bretton Woods (and the start of GATT) was an important step in capitalists shaking off the postwar control of national governments, and we should appreciate the difference.
I sympathize with your frustration, but the world has an infinite supply of greedy idiots. They will arise faster than you could shoot with one of those gatling-gun things from Predator.
The whole point of “Game of Thrones” is that killing bad guys just leaves the chair vacant for the next bad guy. It’s the chair you have to get rid of.
yeah. i don’t disagree. we have these hard cut off numbers all over the place for assistance, and it really does mean that sometimes getting a raise means you have less to spend.
on a lot of issues in the states, i think simply being willing to address things like minimum wage would be a great step. but, just like getting rid of bump stocks would be acknowledging gun regulation is necessary – the far right has a hard and fast line against anything that would dilute the economic power of whites and especially the white upper-class.
universal health care, high quality affordable public transportation, free college tuition – anything that frees up dollars spent on basic survival in order to use that money to improve a person’s lot in life.
but, of course, see above. because the right repackages anything that helps society as a whole into a made-up plan about stealing guns, jobs, money, or land.
It’s only unfortunate if you’re a psychopath. The real reality is that most places are so far from this mythical crossover that you can’t even see it from where we are now due to curvature of the universe.
Remember, this is about the poorest of countries. You’re just assuming that they are nowhere near the crossover point despite the World Bank’s recommendation clearly saying they’re beyond the crossover point.
There’s no easy path, but in my opinion the first thing that needs to be done is removing corporate money from politics. It’ll be very difficult in a two-party system like in US, but in Europe political options change all the time.
I prefer the Fred (Cristopher Lambert) solution in Subway. Be the happiest greedy idiot you can be. Blow up every safe (metaphorically or not?) that you see, hang out with wild characters, and have a few laughs in the underground.
