Lily Bjorlin, Chapter 13, Question 5

What struck me most in this chapter was how a fair amount of the determining factors between a wealthy nation and a poverty stricken nation are things that the nation has little to no control over. For example, a wealthy nation has effective government institutions, but the quality of government institutions was linked in the study done by Daron Acemoglu, Simon Johnson, and James Robinson to how that area was originally settled or colonized way back when. Current governments have no control over whether they were an "extractive state" or a hospitable area hundreds of years ago, yet it determines in part what their economy is like today. Also, geography is completely luck of the draw. Countries don't decide "Oh let's have a temperate climate today, but tomorrow I'm thinking to switch it up and be tropical, then the next day we should be a tundra." But only two of the thirty "rich" countries have tropical climates. The temperature and weather just isn't conducive to lots of agriculture and good health. However, I was surprised natural resources didn't have as much of an effect as I thought which is good news for countries who weren't gifted with a natural gas deposit or lots of coal that could be mined.