Reflections on Poverty
Author(s) -
Wharton Clifton R.
Publication year - 1990
Publication title -
american journal of agricultural economics
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.949
H-Index - 111
eISSN - 1467-8276
pISSN - 0002-9092
DOI - 10.2307/1242521
Subject(s) - annuity , chief executive officer , officer , executive summary , citation , management , mutual fund , economics , accounting , actuarial science , political science , law , finance , life annuity , pension
Most Asian cultures revere age. In Korea, for example, when you become an elder at the age of 61, there is a special birthday celebration called a "Hwan-Gap." Afterward, the entire community treats the elder as a special person. And if male, the elder gets to wear a wonderful black stovepipe top hat called a "Gac." By coincidence, I was 61 when you named me an AAEA Fellow two years ago. So today is my first occasion to thank you for my "HwanGap," and my AAEA fellowship-your symbolic conferral of my Korean top hat! The Asian reverence for age is rooted in the idea that with age comes wisdom. But as I stand before you today, and as I look back on many years of involvement in international agricultural development, I must confess that I do not feel wise. Quite the contrary. When I compare the way I feel today with how I felt forty years ago, when my development career was just beginning, I find myself far less confident, far more troubled. Then, I was sure I had the answerssome anyway, if not all of them. Now, I have mostly questions, and some uncertainty whether even those are the ones we really ought to be asking.