Haiti in a Nutshell
Written by James Ostrowski on January 18, 2010 – 9:29 am -Haiti’s problem is not an earthquake but poverty. Which is to say their problem is a government that thwarts a market economy that could produce wealth.
Poverty greatly increased the damage from earthquake and has also made the recovery process nearly impossible.
Now, following the principle that government creates its demand, various governments are now coming to the rescue with their usual glacial pace and hostile interference with non-governmental relief efforts.
The result is that the prestige of government as our savior will be enhanced and there will be no movement towards liberty in Haiti, which is what its people so desperately need.
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January 18th, 2010 at 1:58 pm
[...] Any effort that accelerates that change will reduce future suffering.4 James Ostrowski – Haiti in a Nutshell [↩]Richard Ebeling – Haiti Needs the Free Market, Not More Political Paternalism [...]
January 18th, 2010 at 2:57 pm
What government is thwarting what market economy? Haiti hasn’t had anything resembling law & order or government since the Duvaliers left.
You know what else hurt? The lack of building codes requiring that structures better withstand temblors.
There is nothing but personal liberty in Port au Prince right now. It doesn’t seem to work that well in practice.
January 18th, 2010 at 4:02 pm
You’re hopeless. Open the mind. It’s never too late.
I actually do research before I post BTW.
January 19th, 2010 at 6:20 am
Quite evidently you don’t. But don’t let that stop you. Clearly, “poverty” in Haiti is caused by the violent coercion of the state or something. Not by corruption or inept government.
January 19th, 2010 at 7:32 am
Even your statements about research are not researched. Look at Heritage’s page on Haiti.
http://www.heritage.org/Index/Country/Haiti
They rank 147th in economic freedom.
January 19th, 2010 at 7:37 am
On building codes, there is little information on the web on this one way or another.
The great thing about the market and safety and working conditions is this: you can buy as much safety as you wish. And you can choose a job with safe working conditions if you are willing to be paid less.
To rely on government standards in any area is foolhardy. As a vegetarian for 35 years, there are many foods the government approves of that I consider deadly and avoid.
Life requires the use of the mind. There is no way around that. Sorry.
January 19th, 2010 at 9:05 am
What good are building codes for a country that can not afford to implement them?
Speaking of Haiti, the news videos look like Haiti is being taken over by occupation forces.
January 19th, 2010 at 9:13 am
I don’t need the Heritage Foundation to explain to me that Haiti is a fundamentally poor and dysfunctional nation-state. I only need to look back at a history of corruption, greed, and oppression by the Duvalier dictatorships, followed by a period of a feckless power vacuum to come to the conclusion that it takes a lot more than “market forces” to turn around a place like Haiti.
You presuppose that Haiti has had anything resembling a functioning economy or government in the past 20 years. If it makes you happy to do so, please do continue.
I know it’s easy to quote the rank the country gets from the conservative think tank you cite, but if you had bothered to actually read the narratives accompanying the rankings, you’d find that Haiti suffers from a feckless, inefficient, corrupt, inept government. Not too strong of a government, but too weak of a government.
I hope that helps.
January 19th, 2010 at 11:37 am
Too weak? They’re a fourth-world country because they’re government is too weak? Then what’s North Korea’s problem? Doesn’t get much more strong than that. Should be nirvana by that standard.
Jim is right, you are hopeless.
January 19th, 2010 at 11:39 am
That would be ‘their’ government.
January 19th, 2010 at 12:21 pm
Nothing in the Heritage report, which you do not contest other than to call them “conservatives” (I’m not one so I miss your point), contradicts my view that Haiti’s problem is a government that makes a market economy impossible.
A corrupt government is not a weak government but a strong one. Corruption flows from power. The more laws and regulations on business, the more bribes can be solicited from business.
January 19th, 2010 at 12:24 pm
Market forces are simply people making free choices on a daily basis. Nothing abstract or mysterious about that.
January 19th, 2010 at 1:13 pm
It’s the old “if only the right people are in charge” argument.
January 19th, 2010 at 1:49 pm
Anyone who equates Haiti’s government with that of North Korea is too stupid - literally, too dumb - to argue with.
Corruption doesn’t always flow from power. It flows chiefly from dishonesty and greed.
The words “Haitian Government” are an oxymoron.
January 19th, 2010 at 3:03 pm
“Corruption doesn’t always flow from power. It flows chiefly from dishonesty and greed.”
Dishonesty and/or greed, along with ego, are the common traits of most people in power. So I would say you are correct that corruption doesn’t ALWAYS flow from power, just 95% of the time.
January 19th, 2010 at 4:29 pm
That $100,000,000 that His Highness Obama promised Haiti will surely buy a lot of corruption, dishonesty and greed. It worked will all the other foreign aid they received in the past. BTW… where is Obama getting the money?
January 19th, 2010 at 5:00 pm
Dishonesty and greed flows from power 95% of the time? Oh, ok. I forgot that you guys equate every government entity, no matter what no matter where, with the mafia.
You’re right. Haitian predatory lawlessness by its gangs and militias fuck them all up. But they’re not the Haitian government, and that was what Jim so clumsily wrote in his post.
Ray, “His Highness Obama” makes you dumb.
January 19th, 2010 at 9:26 pm
On whose authority does His Highness Obama claim to offer $100,000,000 to Haiti? Unless he thinks he has a divine right to take the money by force for his false philanthropy.
January 20th, 2010 at 6:11 am
While Ray tries to change the subject, I’ll note that no one has a salient response to my pointing out that the real power in Haiti is made up of thugs, gangs, and mafias. Not a central government. Therefore, Ostrowski’s “research” was for naught, and his point was nonsense.
Next.
January 20th, 2010 at 7:34 am
I based my post on Heritage’s longstanding and apparently well-researched survey.
You based your post as usual on nothing.
There are thugs, gangs and mafias in the United States.
I’m a researcher. You’re an opinionator.
January 20th, 2010 at 9:52 am
The thugs, gangs, and mafias in this country have to worry about law enforcement.
There is no such thing in Haiti.
You’re an ideological zealot who sees the world through a very narrow framework. I’m an opinionator.
Both you and the Heritage Foundation miss the point with Haiti.
But it’s good to worry about permitting of new shops while Haitians and aid workers pull bodies out of the rubble of the capitol and surrounding areas. Because the libertarian cause is more important than humanitarianism.
January 20th, 2010 at 10:22 am
No, the two are the same. The actual facts show that governments are incompetent at rescuing people in mass disasters. We saw at Katrina that the FEMA set up a perimeter and barred private rescue teams from helping. That’s just point one in a long indictment. You see, as always, I do actual research before I post on most topics. I have read Jim Bovard’s book on FEMA in the golden era of Clinton so I actually know what I’m talking about it.
January 20th, 2010 at 10:25 am
Not to mention the pathetic performance of government after the October Surprise storm. I did my own research on that one and saw little evidence of any government response around Buffalo for several days after the storm.
What happens is, they want things to look bad for FEMA, so they sit on their hands. That’s government, institutionalized irresponsibility.
January 20th, 2010 at 10:41 am
And FEMA has what, precisely, to do with Haiti?
Yeah, I didn’t think so.
Thanks for the lesson on tangential information, though!
January 20th, 2010 at 12:01 pm
It’s a rescue bureaucracy which will act like any thing of that nature: obstruct competitors, respond slowly and otherwise act in its own self-interest.
January 20th, 2010 at 12:02 pm
The law enforcement in Haiti is mostly the thugs operating with a badge and gun per the government.
January 20th, 2010 at 1:16 pm
You guys have absolutely no idea what you’re talking about, you have absolutely no grasp - excuse me, beyond a Heritage Foundation report - of the situation in Haiti, you make stuff up out of whole cloth, or try to equate the situation in Haiti with situations in America, or perhaps in some generic Latin American countries.
And then, after all your misinformed ignorant bluster you tell me how much research you’ve done before going off on some tangent.
Yes, Jim. UNICEF and the Red Cross are in Haiti to act out of their own self-interest. Yes, Mike, there is really tight law enforcement in Haiti. You guys totally know what you’re talking about.
January 20th, 2010 at 4:50 pm
Haiti has been a slum for a hundred years despite numerous interventions by the US government. Propping up dictators was one of the games played. Despite all our attempts at nation building there, it has remained a slum. Tell me what will change things now.
And what exactly do you know about Haiti that nobody else does?
January 21st, 2010 at 6:44 am
Mike - I don’t know anything about Haiti beyond the fact that when I lived in Boston, I had a glut of Haitian clients, and my friends are in the process of trying to adopt a Haitian orphan. So, I know second-hand that the notion that the government there functions even on a basic level is false.
Apart from that, you’re right that the past has been horrible in Haiti due to a variety of reasons - us included.
One suggestion I heard on NPR last night was that after the tsunami, aid agencies employed locals who were affected by it to work on rebuilding projects. This employed them, taught them skills, and helped get the local economies moving again.
Something like that might be really helpful in Haiti.
January 21st, 2010 at 7:29 am
Right, government doesn’t function but there are drug gangs (which implies drug law enforcement) and it takes 180 days to get a license to open a business.
Once again, this is a familiar pattern. Blogging off the top of one’s head.
January 21st, 2010 at 10:02 am
Who said anything about drug gangs? Seriously, you sound more and more idiotic with each comment you leave about this. Perhaps you’re just baiting me because no one the fuck comments on this sad excuse of a blog unless I chime in, but seriously - citing Heritage Foundation excreta you found lying on the floor of the internet isn’t the opposite of “blogging off the top of one’s head”, which is clearly not what I do.
You, OTOH, just make stuff up out of whole cloth. Like the “drug gang” quip, rebutting a point no one made.
January 21st, 2010 at 10:22 am
It’s very diffcult to argue with someone who is so lacking in relevant knowledge. I would have to give you a primer in the subject first.
Liberals hardly ever come to this site because they find out quickly that they cannot defend their positions. You don’t have that inhibition since most of what you say is assertions and insults, not dialogue.
January 21st, 2010 at 10:32 am
No, Jim. It’s very difficult to argue with someone who goes into every single issue affecting mankind with a preconceived agenda checklist, adds to it a casual regurgitation of some partisan think tank’s opinion, and then accuses others of being uninformed.
It’s quite an easy rhetorical trick, and you’ve definitely mastered it. For sure, you’ve tricked people into thinking you know what the hell you’re talking about. But you haven’t tricked everybody.
Nobody hardly ever comes to this site because it’s formulaic and predictable. You wouldn’t know a dialogue if it hit you in the mouth, attached to an anvil. So, let’s cut the bullshit, K?
January 21st, 2010 at 10:54 am
As I said, no dialogue with you is possible because you are so uninformed about basic issues like the war on drugs (about which I have published many times) and the meaning of “corruption” and the meaning of the term “bureaucracy.” It’s really like trying to engage a high school senior.
As for traffic, our stats are public and available at the bottom of the page.
January 21st, 2010 at 11:27 am
Why are you changing the subject to the war on drugs? No one said anything about drug gangs in Haiti until you brought it up, out of the clear blue sky.
If I’m a high school senior, you’re in preschool, trying not to spill the milk in your sippy cup.
January 21st, 2010 at 12:05 pm
This is so tiring. I really need to charge tuition.
You mentioned gangs first and also said Haiti has a weak not a strong government.
But Haiti’s drug gangs flourish in part because of local and international drug laws. And they bribe Haitian officials to look the other way.
That’s the point I made earlier about corruption arising from power, the power to arrest for drug possession for example.
This stuff is really simple if you have studied for issues for thirty years.
January 21st, 2010 at 1:52 pm
I wrote “gangs”. I did not use the adjective “drug”.
You’re right. It _is_ simple.
January 21st, 2010 at 4:50 pm
You’re an ideological zealot who sees the world through a very narrow framework. I’m an opinionator.
Better check yourself—your nothing of the latter and everything of the former.
BTW, you could use a shave. put some old clothes on ya and you could pass for a skid row bum.
January 21st, 2010 at 7:40 pm
Hank, no one asked you, and my appearance is quite beside the point. About what one would expect from you, however.
January 21st, 2010 at 10:32 pm
“Mike - I don’t know anything about Haiti beyond the fact that when I lived in Boston, I had a glut of Haitian clients, and my friends are in the process of trying to adopt a Haitian orphan.”
A couple of things…
Haiti has been ruled by elites and the government and it’s services exist to protect them. This is possible because of widespread poverty and illiteracy. I don’t know if your clients were poor refugees or losers from power struggles.
I know a couple who adopted two Haitian “orphans” a few years ago. Without going into detail a few things were questionable. Were they really orphans? There was a considerable sum of money involved. Who was getting it and who was taking a cut? I don’t know what your friends have told you about their situation.
Drug trafficking: Haiti and the Dominican Republic are the source of a huge amount of drugs spread from the east coast, NYC, and inland, heroin and cocaine specifically. There’s been a long documented history of Haitian government involvement in this and the drug sourcing information is right from the DEA.
There is a strong government in Haiti. They keep the powerful rich and the rest poor. That’s the very definition of a strong government. Of course, here, the plutocracy can’t be as blatant as some of these third world nations but make no mistake about it: they come first and the people second. It’s always been that way through all of history.
January 22nd, 2010 at 8:44 am
No, there is not a strong government in Haiti, nor has there been since Duvalier was overthrown in the mid-80s.
Quite the opposite, the government is feckless and weak both in its structure and in implementing policy, and policing the country.
The elites in Haiti are doing just fine protecting their fiscal interests and power very well without the assistance or sanction of what passes/d for a government in that country.
January 22nd, 2010 at 11:31 am
“The elites in Haiti are doing just fine protecting their fiscal interests and power very well without the assistance or sanction of what passes/d for a government in that country.”
That’s yours and the authors of that reports perception. The elites wouldn’t be able to hang on to power and stripmine the public without the government’s enabling them. Failure to deliver anything to the vast underclass is by design. If you’re a believer that government is/can/should be a force for good then I guess you would call it a weak and feckless state.
January 22nd, 2010 at 12:34 pm
In any event, there is no free market and that’s why they’re poor.
January 23rd, 2010 at 12:52 pm
Reductio ad Ostrowskium.
No thought or analysis required beyond what’s written above.
January 23rd, 2010 at 1:21 pm
Well, once you know the truth, you usually stop digging. You know, E=MC2, A is A, and all that.
But ferreting out error remains a fulltime job because many people insist on re-inventing the wheel.
January 23rd, 2010 at 10:24 pm
“Starting a business takes an average of 195 days, compared to the world average of 35 days. Obtaining a business license takes about five times longer than the world average of 218 days.”
“Foreign investors are granted national treatment, but investment in sensitive sectors such as public health, agriculture, electricity, water, and telecommunications requires special authorization. In general, natural resources are considered to be the property of the state, and mining activities require concessions and permits. Laws are transparent but not consistently enforced. Bureaucracy and red tape are burdensome.”
Huh, who woulda thunk?
January 23rd, 2010 at 10:28 pm
“Inflation has been high, averaging 13.1 percent between 2006 and 2008. Annual inflation increased rapidly in most of 2008, owing to sharp rises in international fuel and food prices, but declined to around zero by June 2009. Prices are generally determined by the market, but the government restricts markups of some products (retailers, for example, may not mark up pharmaceutical products by more than 40 percent) and strictly controls the prices of petroleum products. ”
Sounds like it should be a paradise with Krugmann like policies…inflation, price controls etc.