Paulson Says Developing Countries Should Avoid Price Controls

[Joanne98]

Source: bloomberg

April 13 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson advised developing nations struggling with soaring commodity costs against using price controls because they may do more harm than good to long-term economic growth.

Governments ``need to resist the temptation of price controls and consumption subsidies that are generally not effective and efficient methods of protecting vulnerable groups,'' Paulson said in the text of a speech to the World Bank's development committee in Washington.

Record prices for commodities from crude oil to rice are causing food shortages and political unrest in poor countries and increasing concern elsewhere about inflation. Paulson said improvements in agriculture and energy conservation are better policies to pursue than government-imposed measures to contain prices, which he said may exacerbate problems.

Paulson delivered his remarks at the semiannual meetings of the International Monetary Fund and World Bank. Yesterday, IMF Managing Director Dominique Strauss-Kahn said further gains in food prices would be ``terrible'' for the world's poor and throw hundreds of thousands into starvation.



Read more: http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=avZSJ.UAchew&refer=home

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In other words. Don't feed starving people because if you do they will starve. Paulson is evil!

[DemocratInSoCal]

1. Paulson Should Grow Some Hair nt

[Zorro]

2. Nixon's Wage and price controls failed

to contain inflation in the early 70s. There are lessons to be learned from that experience, and that's what Paulson is saying.

[Hestia]

3. But shouldn't we be doing the exact opposite of anything the neocons

advocate? They've been wrong about everything, so shouldn't we be looking the other way for solutions? What price controls did Nixon instigate in the 1970s? I sure don't remember that.

[Dr.Phool]

5. Nixon instituted wage and price controls in the early '70s.

They had to stay within certain parameters. If they exceeded those, they had to be approved by a board in Washington. They held up my union's raise for over a year.

[tritsofme]

6. That sounds like a piss poor childish agenda.

"Lets do the opposite of everything they do"

And if you were alive in the 70s, you had to know about the Nixon price controls.

[louis-t]

7. I remember "Phase 1, Phase 2", etc.

The result was a 'sling-shot' effect when price controls expired or were removed.

[Dr.Phool]

4. After all these years, I finally found out who was holding up raise for over a year.

Donald Rumsfeld. I read about it in "The Shock Doctrine".

[depakid]

12. On the other hand, Rooseveldt's succeeded

So much for that all or nothing argument....

[Warren Stupidity]

8. See Haiti: let them eat dirt.

It is always the same advice from the same cru of failed elites. Eventually the poor just get too poor and too numerous to give a fuck anymore and we have a Revolution, and then we have a Terror, and then we get a whole new set of elites. For a while the new elites might actually be better than the topped off previous bunch, but pretty soon they are about the same or worse. Then eventually they fail too.

(Edit: where the fuck is 'Hati'? I've never heard of that country.)

[H8fascistcons]

9. Hey Paulson

I don't know if price controls are the correct way to go but mind your own business and let other countries run their government as they see fit, you Fascist neocon freak!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[struggle4progress]

10. See them headlights ahead, Paulson? Our own engine could be in a train-wreck right soon

Maybe now ain't th'most bestest moment t'be givin other folk drivin advice. Or is ya th'type what jumps off right after yellin at th'fireman t'keep his head down and stay busy shovelin coal?

[alfredo]

11. The neo cons only believe in wage control.