Last time I heard, every country that attempted to apply the IMF’s recommendations faced economic and social disaster; their ideas are reputedly naive at best and malicious at worst.
Ok, now your turn: can you provide an example of a country where applying IMF recommendations resulted in more “economic and social disaster” then the country was already in before the IMF got involved.
Well none of those links contain examples of “economic and social disaster”. The closest think to a concrete country that I could find in them was Greece. And even there the IMF/EU bailout did help, if only in a “kick the can down the road” kind of way. If any thing, from what I heard the problem in Greece is that the IMF wasn’t insistent enough on structural reforms, instead going for a tax-increase heavy “austerity”.
Well India is the standard IMF success story.
Ok, now your turn: can you provide an example of a country where applying IMF recommendations resulted in more “economic and social disaster” then the country was already in before the IMF got involved.
Here’s a quick-and-dirty first things I found. Checking out peer-reviewed papers and other primary sources will take me a little more time.
Well none of those links contain examples of “economic and social disaster”. The closest think to a concrete country that I could find in them was Greece. And even there the IMF/EU bailout did help, if only in a “kick the can down the road” kind of way. If any thing, from what I heard the problem in Greece is that the IMF wasn’t insistent enough on structural reforms, instead going for a tax-increase heavy “austerity”.