Holy revolution, Batman!

First, I just have an interesting little tid-bit to report: I'm writing a scholarship essay where I'm supposed to talk about the index for economic freedom and whether it can be used to explain why some countries grow and prosper, and others don't (go here if you want to check out the index). One of the issues I'm thinking of discussing (I'm still in the research/outlining stage) is about how the index ignores growth with equity, and how this can be detrimental to growth. So to talk about that, I would need to know how unequal Bolivia is (of course I'm writing about Bolivia). I went to see the UN rankings that compared the per-capita income levels of the wealthiest 10% of a population with the income levels of the bottom 10%. Guess where Bolivia ranks? Dead last: the wealthiest 10% earn 168 times more than the bottom 10 (Bolivia is one of only three countries in the world that break into triple-digits). Can you imagine that? If it were the US (where the ratio is only 16 to 1), that would be like someone making $10,000 a year (ie pretty damn poor) and the rich people averaging $1,680,000 a year. Wow. I'd press for socialism, too! Things don't get much better when you widen the measurement to the top and bottom quintiles: it's still 42 to 1, and Bolivia still ranks 4th-worst in terms of income disparity. This might explain why I see 18 year olds in Jaguars hanging out drinking beer while mothers with three kids collect their bottles and cans for the deposit.

Anyways, I just thought that was really amazing and thought I would share.

Oh, and in case anyone was wondering, Japan is the most equitable of the rich world, with a 4.5 to 1 ratio. But they're still beat out by Azerbaijan, where the ratio is only 3.3 to 1 (although per-capita income is only $4,600 a head. I think it's easier to even out if no one really has money).