William McNamara Quotes

The primary task of developing countries is to develop the economy and eradicate poverty. Without economic growth, there would be no material basis for a better life or better environment for the people. But economic growth must not be achieved at the cost of environment or resources. In the absence of proper resource and environmental protection, there could be no sustainable economic development.

If you take the burden of health care, of diseases off the backs of some other countries, it gives them a chance to use their own very limited resources in ways that help their people. And also there's a hopelessness associated with deadly diseases, that if that can be alleviated, people can build their own economies in their own countries and they'll be less reliant on the developed world for help.

In a perfect world what poor countries at the lowest rungs of economic development need is not a multi-party democracy, but in fact a decisive benevolent dictator to push through the reforms required to get the economy moving

The dominant orthodoxy in development economics was that Third World countries were trapped in a vicious cycle of poverty that could be broken only by massive foreign aid from the more prosperous industrial nations of the world. This was in keeping with a more general vision on the Left that people were essentially divided into three categories - the heartless, the helpless, and wonderful people like themselves, who would rescue the helpless by playing Lady Bountiful with the taxpayers' money.

If one is talking to a finance minister of a poor country, moral arguments tend not to get very far. But if you can argue that their country is going to grow 2 percent faster per year if they can just harness the power of the female half of the population more effectively, that is an argument they consider.

It is only in the backward countries of the world that increased production is still an important object.

Obviously it's easier to grow faster when you are a less developed country than when you are where the U.S. is.

It was shameful that, after Haiti, Colombia was the second most unequal country in Latin America. But we've achieved some things; the inequality is coming down, and coming down fast. The growing economy has provided us with the funds to finance a very progressive social policy that has reduced extreme poverty. We have the lowest inflation rate of all Latin-America countries and the highest growth rate.

The rich do not have to invest enough in the poorest countries to make them rich; they need to invest enough so that these countries can get their foot on the economic ladder . . . Economic development works. It can be successful. It tends to build on itself. But it must get started.

The Commonwealth is a mixture of developing and developed world, in which the developed countries were very influential and their policies hold sway most of the time.

I think one big improvement would be if we somehow made it cheaper and easier for developing countries to learn from the sad experience of some of the developed countries, and also from some of the positive experiences we have of building good transportation systems, like high-speed rail.

Unfettered market American-style capitalism doesn't work. Developing countries can't afford that kind of luxury. They just can't afford it. Period. If there's a mistake, they can't afford to put out $2 trillion.

I believe that without looking at each other as rivals or as competitors, in a democratic India, operating in the framework of an open economy, an open society has, I think, some significance for developing countries, not only in Asia but outside Asia.

...children born today-in both the industrialized world and developing countries-will live longer and be healthier, they will get more food, a better education, a higher standard of living, more leisure time and far more possibilities-without the global environment being destroyed.

In China, it was always said that a double-digit rate of growth would be dangerous. Now, the country has a growth rate of 6.9 percent and suddenly that is supposed to be a catastrophe for the global economy.

I want to bring wealth back to our country so we can afford them.

I am myself impressed by the great social advantages of increasing the stock of capital until it ceases to be scarce.

The rate of profit... is naturally low in rich and high in poor countries, and it is always highest in the countries which are going fastest to ruin.

I am afraid there are people who want to stop the economic growth, the rise in the standard of living (though not their own) and the ability of man to use the expanding wealth, science and technology for solving the actual pressing problems of mankind, especially of the developing countries.

When we have $20 trillion in debt, and our country's a mess, you know, it's one thing to have $20 trillion in debt and our roads are good and our bridges are good and everything's in great shape, our airports. Our airports are like from a third world country.

I firmly believe that if you help a woman, then you educate a child, you help the family. Because women are very focused on health care and education and on the family. So if you help a woman, you help the family, you help the village, you help the country. And so empowering women is a very important part of moving, not just women forward, but the economy of the nation forward. Particularly in very substandard nations.

Culture changes with economic development.

It is science alone that can solve the problems of hunger and poverty, of insanitation and illiteracy, of superstition and deadening custom and tradition, of vast resources running to waste, or a rich country inhabited by starving people... Who indeed could afford to ignore science today? At every turn we have to seek its aid... The future belongs to science and those who make friends with science.

Instead of the scream of a fish hawk scaring the fishes, is heard the whistle of the steam-engine, arousing a country to its progress.

President Obama has brought this country back economically so far from where we were when he took office, and Hillary Clinton is going to take that baton and take us even further. And what she's doing is what we have done for generations, which is really build out an infrastructure of opportunity in America.