I do follow this channel, but I don't really like these geography problem videos, becuse they are rather superficial and too eager to link everything to geography of certain countries. AFAIK the...
I do follow this channel, but I don't really like these geography problem videos, becuse they are rather superficial and too eager to link everything to geography of certain countries. AFAIK the biggest problem of Greece has been corruption. In the modern world, tax collection is almost always indirect throught govt cuts in prices or directly from businessmen through banks or local offices, so the infrastructure hardly correlates with that; the problem is tax evasion, not problems in tax collection, basically the same as what we have in Turkey. The parts of a country that pays the most of the taxes should be the parts that have the best infrastructure (i.e. cities) anyways, no?
Yeah, the video does remind me a bit of Jared Diamond's theorizing, where he takes a hugely broad set of topics and attempts to boil them down to "primary" causes so much that the overarching...
Yeah, the video does remind me a bit of Jared Diamond's theorizing, where he takes a hugely broad set of topics and attempts to boil them down to "primary" causes so much that the overarching theory loses all nuance and a lot of accuracy in the process. Geography has historically had a huge impact on geopolitics and governance and even still does to this day, but definitely to a much lesser extent than ever IMO. E.g Wendover was definitely reaching with the attempt to tie in Greece's current tax collection issues when that has much less to do with geographical infrastructure limitations and way more to do with corruption, tax evasion, culture and poverty, as you said.
I do follow this channel, but I don't really like these geography problem videos, becuse they are rather superficial and too eager to link everything to geography of certain countries. AFAIK the biggest problem of Greece has been corruption. In the modern world, tax collection is almost always indirect throught govt cuts in prices or directly from businessmen through banks or local offices, so the infrastructure hardly correlates with that; the problem is tax evasion, not problems in tax collection, basically the same as what we have in Turkey. The parts of a country that pays the most of the taxes should be the parts that have the best infrastructure (i.e. cities) anyways, no?
Yeah, the video does remind me a bit of Jared Diamond's theorizing, where he takes a hugely broad set of topics and attempts to boil them down to "primary" causes so much that the overarching theory loses all nuance and a lot of accuracy in the process. Geography has historically had a huge impact on geopolitics and governance and even still does to this day, but definitely to a much lesser extent than ever IMO. E.g Wendover was definitely reaching with the attempt to tie in Greece's current tax collection issues when that has much less to do with geographical infrastructure limitations and way more to do with corruption, tax evasion, culture and poverty, as you said.