OPINION

Aid for poor nations can hurt them

News, Angus Deaton, Published on 15/10/2015

» In Scotland, I was brought up to think of policemen as allies and to ask one for help when I needed it. Imagine my surprise when, as a 19-year-old on my first visit to the United States, I was met by a stream of obscenities from a New York City cop who was directing traffic in Times Square after I asked him for directions to the nearest post office. In my subsequent confusion, I inserted my employer's urgent documents into a trash bin that, to me, looked a lot like a mailbox.