"As people are freer from their government, their income increases, and as economic conditions improve, poverty associated with lack of access to water decreases." PHY

"There is nothing particularly innovative about short-sightedness and lack of compassion. Nevertheless, the way libertarians combine these elements is innovative." DIEF

The economic development lesson is clear: Have a system of economic freedom and grow rich. Extensive government control, weak property rights and government corruption almost guarantee poverty. A country's institutional infrastructure is critical to its economic growth and the well-being of its citizens. The most critical are protection of private property, enforcement of contracts and rule of law.

To help our fellow man around the world, we must convince him to create the institutional infrastructure for wealth creation. Foreign aid, International Monetary Fund bailouts and other handouts are not substitutes. They just make political survival possible for the elite whose self-serving policies keep a nation poor. Except for immediate disaster relief, foreign aid is probably the worst thing the West can do for poor countries. After all, how much foreign aid is necessary for a country to create the foundations for growth: rule of law, enforcement of contracts and private property rights protection?

WorldNetDaily 07 February 2007

Heritage House's 2005 Index of Economic Freedom studied prosperity and economic freedom by analyzing 50 independent variables indicative of freedom in 161 countries. The greater the level of government interference in the economy and the less economic freedom a country enjoys.

Based on the index, Conservative Life observes, "There is a strong correlation between wealth and economic freedom.... The results are CLEAR. Less government = greater growth and prosperity." He also notes, "... under George W. Bush the United States is moving in the wrong direction." Heritage House explains,

Government spending, however, expands without constraints. The massive farm subsidies of 2002 were followed by the massive Medicare prescription entitlement of 2003. Increased regulatory laws in the securities field have raised compliance costs in capital markets, forcing some firms simply to buy back their stock and retreat from public markets.

Anti-dumping trade barriers are growing, and inflation rose following the steep plunge in the dollar.

In short, the United States, while still a vibrant country, is at a crossroads: It will either continue to be a leader in economic freedom or idly watch other countries pass it by.

Jonathan Rothenberg at BlogsforBush took note of some of the same statistics and applied them to the program for Tsunami disaster relief. He writes,

"We can choose to pour ever more money down a foreign aid hole, but it will do no good unless recipient nations decide to adopt policies that will generate ecnomic growth ... the best way to eradicate poverty, disease and hunger is not to coddle and prop up corrupt dictatorships, but to vigorously promote the freedom that invariably drags prosperity along with it."

blogicus.com

Overall Rank	113	6
Country	Burkina Faso	UK
Year	2007	2007
Overall Score	55	81.6
Business Freedom	42.7	92.1
Trade Freedom	57.2	76.6
Fiscal Freedom	84.9	74.6
Freedom from Gov't	88.9	54.2
Monetary Freedom	76.8	79.3
Investment Freedom	40	90
Financial Freedom	50	90
Property Rights	30	90
Freedom from Corruption	34	86
Labour Freedom	45.1	82.7

For several weeks during the autumn of 2005, riots raged in the streets of Paris. Every night, hundreds of cars were burned, shops were vandalized, and violence ruled. French President Jacques Chirac concluded that his nation was suffering from a profound "malaise," a word that indeed captures the reality of economic and social problems in many European countries. After centuries of economic leadership, Europe must now face the truth that its governing institutions—especially its labor markets—are deeply flawed. Those who finally took to the streets, native and immigrant citizens alike, were severely affected by unemployment.

France may be the most stubborn defender of the so-called European social model, characterized by vast government intervention in the economy, but many other governments in Western Europe are committed to the same philosophy. Presidents and prime ministers devote speeches to nostalgic messages and promise to maintain and protect the existing social model. Their rhetoric translates into policies that are a new kind of protectionism for traditional jobs, a protectionism that is reflected in the widespread official resistance to a single European Union (EU) market in services, disapprovals of business mergers, and an anxious debate about the "Polish plumber" representing free flows of labor within the EU.

We Europeans are clearly at a crossroads. Either we look to the future and learn from successful market-oriented reforms, or we look back to the past and continue trying to shield old occupations from international economics. It is a choice between openness and protectionism, between modernization and nostalgia—indeed, between government intervention and freedom itself. The problems of Europe are not born overseas, but are innate to the process of internal economic development and change. That is why a tighter adherence to a failing model will only exacerbate current problems and lead to more unrest in European cities. Rioting and decline is a destiny that no European wants to face.

Yet there is reason for optimism. Never before have so many countries been so deeply involved in the global economy, and the benefits of globalization—economic growth, employment, and competition—are ever clearer. Never before have so many countries made successful free-market reforms, which is an inspiration for others. Almost all European countries can point to at least one successful reform, and as we copy each other's successes, the future should rapidly become much brighter.

In my view, of all the areas that are still in need of substantial reform, the most important is the labor market. People—especially the young—want jobs and freedom, not dependence on government. ...

IEF

Be unsurpised to learn that Table 1 in the above article lists the UK second only behind the Caucasion republic of Georgia as possessing the 'benefits' of labour 'freedom'.

That's 'freedom' as in freedom to sack.   UES

Defining Economic Freedom

Economic freedom is that part of freedom that is concerned with the material autonomy of the individual in relation to the state and other organized groups.

An individual is economically free who can fully control his or her labor and property. This economic component of human liberty is related to—and perhaps a necessary condition for—political freedom, but it is also valuable as an end in itself.

The authors of the Index perceive economic freedom as a positive concept, recognizing that its traditional definition as an absence of government coercion or constraint must also include a sense of liberty as distinct from anarchy.

Governments are instituted to create basic protections against the ravages of nature, so that positive economic rights such as property and contract are given social as well as individ-ual defense against the destructive tendencies of others.

The definition of economic freedom therefore en-compasses all liberties and rights of production, distribution, or consumption of goods and services. The highest form of economic freedom provides an absolute right of property ownership, fully realized freedoms of movement for labor, capital, and goods, and an absolute absence of coercion or constraint of economic liberty beyond the extent necessary for citizens to protect and maintain liberty itself.

In other words, individuals are free to work, produce, consume, and invest in any way they please, and that freedom is both protected by the state and unconstrained by the state.

All government action involves coercion. Some minimal coercion is necessary for the citizens of a community or nation to defend themselves, promote the evolution of civil society, and enjoy the fruits of their labor. This Lockean idea is embodied in the U.S. Constitution. For example, citizens are taxed to provide revenue for the protection of person and property as well as for a common defense.

Most political theorists also accept that certain goods—what economists call “public goods”—can be supplied more conveniently by government than through private means. Of particular interest are those economic freedoms that are also public goods, such as the maintenance of a police force to protect property rights, a monetary authority to maintain a sound currency, and an impartial judiciary to enforce contracts among parties.

When government coercion rises beyond the minimal level, however, it becomes corrosive to freedom—and the first freedom affected is economic freedom.

Logically, an expansion of state power requires enforcement and therefore funding, which is extracted from the people. Exactly where that line is crossed is open to reasoned debate.

Throughout history, governments have imposed a wide array of constraints on economic activity.

Constraining economic choice distorts and diminishes the production, distribution, and consumption of goods and services (including, of course, labor services).

The establishment of a price control is perhaps the clearest example of the distortionary effect of state coercion because of its well-known disruption of the equilibrium of supply and demand.

The 10 Economic Freedoms.

Overall economic freedom, defined by multiple rights and liberties, can be quantified as an index of less abstract components. The index we conceive uses 10 specific freedoms, some as composites of even further detailed and quantifiable components. A detailed discussion of each of these factors and their component variables follows this overview.

Business freedom is the ability to create, operate, and close an enterprise quickly and easily. Burdensome, redundant regulatory rules are the most harmful barriers to business freedom.

Trade freedom is a composite measure of the absence of tariff and non-tariff barriers that affect imports and exports of goods and services.

Monetary freedom combines a measure of price stability with an assessment of price controls. Both inflation and price controls distort market activity. Price stability without microeconomic intervention is the ideal state for the free market.

Freedom from government is defined to include all government expenditures—including consumption and transfers—and state-owned enterprises. Ideally, the state will provide only true public goods, with an absolute minimum of expenditure.

Fiscal freedom is a measure of the burden of government from the revenue side. It includes both the tax burden in terms of the top tax rate on income (individual and corporate separately) and the overall amount of tax revenue as portion of GDP.

Property rights is an assessment of the ability of individuals to accumulate private property, secured by clear laws that are fully enforced by the state.

Investment freedom is an assessment of the free flow of capital, especially foreign capital.

Financial freedom is a measure of banking security as well as independence from government control. State ownership of banks and other financial institutions such as insurer and capital markets is an inefficient burden, and political favoritism has no place in a free capital market.

Freedom from corruption is based on quantitative data that assess the perception of corruption in the business environment, including levels of governmental legal, judicial, and administrative corruption.

Labor freedom is a composite measure of the ability of workers and businesses to interact without restriction by the state.

Equal Weight. In the Index of Economic Freedom, all 10 factors are equally weighted in order not to bias the overall score toward any one factor or policy direction. ...

IEF 2007