Latin Economism

The second person has pointed out this piece of rubbish to me, using the word "interesting" and I grant them that. I know all the cool kids are into The Economist these days, but I generally find it unreadable. Still, I enjoyed this piece for its obscenity more than anything else, let's have a peak:

The article starts off talking about a woman of modest means who isn't cold, despite the recent cold snap in Santiago, and thus leaves us with a well-adorned, anecdotal impression that Chile is, like the headline states, "Destitute No More".

That's the big black headline, and it is true that Chileans are getting more credit; if I buy a 6-pack with an ATM card I'm asked if I would like to make payments on it, or if I'm feeling reckless and would rather pay in one lump sum, wife and kids be damned.

So, many Chileans have access to "things", that's for sure. But while making such a bold statement about "no more, destitution," the article fails to point out the shantytown on the local news during the recent snow, because the roofs caved in. Talk about a snowjob. This is 10 minutes away from gated communities and rapid construction of magnificent, multi-storied houses protected by alarm systems, pedigree dogs (the Armstrongs have the RROTE-while-air, the Cox's PEENS-chair is really harmless, don't think twice about its remarkably sonorous growl punctuated by savage barking).

Perhaps less destitute, but hardly "no more". Nor, like the article's sub-header contends, is Chile anywhere near "abolishing poverty", despite the big optimistic bottom-right graph. No cross referencing needed, the self-same article points out that by European standards Chile is mired in an abysmal 27% poverty. Of course, why apply such standards to Chileans?

The piece also points out the inhuman US $90 poverty line. So...what's the point? I probably just don't get it, but it seems as if it were written to fill up as many paragraphs with fluff and Christmas Day soup kitchen nonsense until finally dropping in some tragic, if incomplete, facts about Chile's actual state of poverty - is it to appear objective and thereby garner credibility, because it fails in that mission for anyone who makes it to the last paragraph, in which the narrative unravels completely and reveals the article to be nothing more than a strained smile of false optimism and condescending tripe for those whom the Economist undoubtedly loses sleep over, night after night: the roughly 80% of Chileans who are barely making ends meet.

We can debate poverty statistics forever, and I'll win the main points, but in this particular case I mostly feel like harping on the obvious, yet appalling condescension with which the article speaks, as proof enough that its writer's intentions are less than wholesome.

The fact that alternative ways of measuring poverty are now being discussed is a sign of how far Chile has come in the past two decades.

Need I say more? No, but I will.

First, "being discussed" isn't enough. Who is discussing it besides Chile economics expert Marcel Claude, who I think claims to be unique by doing so. I'm not even asking for a close-up similar to the one used to bolster that "destitute no more" argument by profiling a program for the extreme poor that hasn't even proven itself effective yet. Names would do, but none are given; the article needn't reflect my views, but it could at least be kind to the reader by offering a substantial take-away on that score.

...is a sign of how far Chile has come in the past two decades

Because after two decades of democracy, free public discourse should be celebrated as a novelty. Well, I do find the (inadvertent?) premise to be laudable - Chile doesn't have free speech, or if it does it's a surprising and huge advance.

Yet has Chile really come that far? Ask Chilean artist and film director Niles Atallah, whose pro-choice video installation for Los Tres at Vina del Mar was censored by the Catholic TV station. TV's bad, the print world must be better off, unless you ask John Dinges author of several books about Pinochet and the dictatorship in Chile, who writes for the the Columbia Journalism Review that:

The irony of Chile’s media is that there was more ideological diversity and journalistic energy in the printed press in the late 1980s, in the waning years of the hard-line dictatorship of General Augusto Pinochet, than now when he is long gone and proponents of democracy are firmly in control.

Just how far has Chile come? Not very far at all. But at least the Economist can write fluff about soup kitchens and patronize Latins for being able to form complete sentences, even if they aren't able to tell us who gets the gold star.