It's not just about the current economic environment. History shows that slashing budgets always leads to recession.

Countries are poor not because their people are lazy; their people are 'lazy' because they are poor.

People who live in poor countries have to be entrepreneurial even just to survive.

It takes time and experience to absorb new technologies, so technologically backward producers need a period of protection from international competition during this period of learning. Such protection is costly, because the country is giving up the chance to import better and cheaper products. However, it is a price that has to be paid if it wants to develop advanced industries.

Culture changes with economic development.

The free market doesn't exist. Every market has some rules and boundaries that restrict freedom of choice. A market looks free only because we so unconditionally accept its underlying restrictions that we fail to see them.

Equality of opportunity is meaningless for those who do not have the capabilities to take advantage of it.