The Sunday Mail
Howdy folks!
Equality is one thing we have to discuss in our motherland. Equality, whither equality?
I remember when I was taking my first-year classes at college we were taught about a concept called Pareto optimality. It’s one thing that still sticks at the back of my mind.
You all folks know that I hate to be academic.
But let’s just dissect Pareto optimality a bit as this concept is of particular interest to me.
This concept talks about a state of allocation of resources in which it is impossible to make any one individual better off without making at least one individual worse off.
Italian economist and engineer Vilfredo Pareto propounded the concept in his studies of economic efficiency and income distribution.
In the Bible, l heard about the ideal scenario of Pareto optimality.
Those who have been to Acts 2 verses 44 and 45 have read that, “Now all who believed were together, and had all things in common, and sold their possessions and goods, and divided them among all, as anyone had need.”
And nowhere else have I heard about this happening.
Out of interest sake, you may want to ask whether this won’t work in the Republic, given how not less than 80 percent of us are said to be Christians.
But the interesting irony is that the majority of billionaires in the world are actually Christians.
Would it not be good, folks, if, for instance, Bill Gates were to equally share his US$75 billion with the entire province of Bulawayo, with a population of 653 337?
Each person would get a cool US$114 795.
And guess what would happen if all the13,1 million people who are millionaires in the world were to find some village to do the same trick?
Even in the science discipline, they have that process called osmosis where particles move from a region of higher concentration to a region of lower concentration.
That ought to be extrapolated in the economic context of our Republic.
Yes, a strict practise of this will only encourage laziness.
Who doesn’t want to be paid for doing nothing?
But there are justifiable scenarios in our economy where we ought to really zoom in on and come up with solutions.
Folks, while initiatives like the land reform programme and indigenisation seek to redress the inequality anomaly that has existed since pre-independence times, there are flaws that call for equality measures to ensure that Pareto’s parity is attained.
Section 56 (6) of our Constitution tells us that the State must take reasonable legislative and other measures to promote equality and to protect or advance people or classes of people who have been disadvantaged by unfair discrimination.
One of the means to attain that is by enforcing Section 298 (d) which says that public funds must be expended transparently, prudently, economically and effectively.
The situation I see in the country is just sickening.
I remember overhearing someone boasting that he had over a thousand hectares of land on which he was growing weeds.
This is prime land that he is just sitting on.
And elsewhere, we have energetic but idle youths.
All they are praying for is a small piece of land; hectare imwe chete zvayo to do a bit of market gardening and sustain their livelihoods.
Then you tell me that we don’t need Pareto here!
Folks, I don’t remember how many times I have quoted the 2014 Finscope Consumer Survey Report.
I don’t hesitate to quote it again.
So, it has told us that 76 percent of the adult population earns US$200 per month or less; a figure that includes 7 percent who do not have an income at all.
It further says that 60 percent have gone without income and have to make a plan for daily needs.
This is up from 51 percent in 2011.
Then the Poverty and Poverty Datum Analysis in Zimbabwe, conducted by the Zimbabwe Statistics Agency in 2012 also established appalling dynamics that point to the fact that we have been registering positive growth rates, ruthless growth — so to speak.
If you still think that I am just babbling, then wait until you hear how our inequality levels are absurd.
The same Zimstat study established that our Gini co-efficient in 2012 was “within the range of countries considered to be highly unequal” and that the majority of the population is living in poverty.
The Gini co-efficient indicates the level at which income is equally or unequally distributed throughout a population.
At 0,423; Zimstat said our Gini co-efficient shows “relative inequality in well-being”.
A Gini co-efficient of one is an indication of complete income inequality, with one person having all the income, while a Gini co-efficient of zero is indicative of complete equality, with everybody earning an equal income.
In light of the above, it is my humble view that we really need to rethink our status quo and come up with measures that ensure something for everyone.
Later folks!
