Milton Friedman, economic competition and poverty

Heath concludes “our victories over famine and extreme poverty during the past two centuries are civilisation’s greatest achievement. It is time we took a well-deserved break from worrying about terrorism, rising crime, social dislocation and all our other problems to celebrate what we have actually got right.”

I suspect Heath is a great fan of George Orwell. Or suffers from head-in-sand-ism.

You wonder if Goklany and Heath are aware HIV-Aids infection rates increased by 2.6 million world-wide between 2004 and 2006, in all regions (according to The Guardian Weekly December 1-7, 2006), always closely linked to poverty. Three-quarters of HIV drugs are still under monopoly production and unaffordable in poor countries. Health workers don’t stay around and economies continue to worsen, giving rise to many other sicknesses.

Competition is not only about money, of course. It also becomes a general social philosophy morphing into violence as expressed by politicians, affecting war and peace, win-at-any-cost sport, violence in pubs, even at private parties.

But that’s another story.