The economic dynamic in Zimbabwe is perversely robust: while ordinary people suffer, black-market dealers and people with foreign bank accounts prosper, making them powerful stakeholders in the perpetuation of devastating economic policies.
Interpretation
The quote highlights the paradox of Zimbabwe's economy, where hardship for many coexists with prosperity for a privileged few.
Samantha Power's quote sheds light on the complex economic landscape of Zimbabwe, where severe economic challenges faced by the general population contrast sharply with the fortunes of black-market dealers and those possessing foreign bank accounts. This disparity creates a situation where a small, wealthy group benefits from and sustains detrimental economic policies, indicating a deeply entrenched system of inequality that impacts the broader society negatively.
In practice
In a social media discussion about economic policies and inequality.
Sanctions did indeed help to bring Iran to the negotiating table. But sanctions did not stop the advance of Iran's nuclear program. Negotiations have done that, and it is in our interest not to deny ourselves the chance to achieve a long-term, comprehensive solution that would deny Iran a nuclear weapon.
Zimbabweans are severely malnourished, and deaths from starvation occur even in the cities. The country has not yet suffered nationwide famine only because international donors have stepped in.
Western governments have generally tried to contain genocide by appeasing its architects. But the sad record of the last century shows that the walls the United States tries to build around genocidal societies almost inevitably shatter.
No more than a surgeon can operate while tweeting can you reach your potential with one ear in, one ear out. You actually have to reacquaint yourself with concentration. We all do.
When dictators feel their support slipping among adults, it is not unusual for them to alter school textbooks in the hope of enlisting impressionable youths in their cause.
Throughout history, when societies face tough economic times, we have seen democratic reforms deferred, decreased trust in government, persecution of minority groups, and a general shrinking of the democratic space.
President Bush announced his new economic plan. The centerpiece was a proposed repeal of the dividend tax on stocks, a boon that could be worth millions of dollars to average Americans. Well, average stock-owning Americans. Technically, Americans who own a significant amount of shares in dividend-dealing companies. Well, rich people, that's what I'm trying to say. They're going to do really well with this.
I am in favor of cutting taxes under any circumstances and for any excuse, for any reason, whenever it's possible. ... because I believe the big problem is not taxes, the big problem is spending.
If you go back to the really long-run questions that interested me, the big question was why, over the centuries, the millennia, has growth been speeding up?
No complaint... is more common than that of a scarcity of money.
The most powerful forces in economics are not numbers or facts. They are prejudices and preferences. No amount of evidence will ever change the degree to which many of the rich and powerful prefer themselves to be richer and more powerful and others poorer and weaker.
Passive commerce . . . should thus . . . [compel us] to content ourselves with the first price of our commodities, and to see the profits of our trade snatched from us, to enrich our enemies and persecutors. That unequalled spirit of enterprise . . . an inexhaustible mine of national wealth, would be stifled and lost; and poverty and disgrace would overspread a country, which, with wisdom, might make herself the admiration and envy of the world.
Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.