A Welfare State for Poor Countries

Ignacy Sachs Most people explicitly or implicitly accept the simplified theory of development which makes of GNP- per-head the main determinant of economic and social structure. For them, there exists but one broad pattern of industrialisation and development, and, since the developed countries have thought in terms of a welfare state only in the recent past, when their GNP was already a multiple of what it is today in the developing countries, the view is that the developing countries should wait rather longer before they provide social services.