Latin America and the Caribbean

In his blog post below, Nate mentions the stark contrast in life expectancy rates between the developed and developing world. It reminded me of something I read recently in Duncan Green’s book From Poverty to Power. Green writes:

“From cradle to grave, a person’s life chances are dominated by the extraordinary levels of inequality that characterize the modern world. A girl born in Norway will almost certainly live to old age. If she is born in Sierra Leone, however, she has a one in four chance of dying before her fifth birthday. A Norwegian girl can expect to go to a good school, followed by university, and to be healthy and cared for right through old age. In Sierra Leone only two in three girls start school at all, and many more drop out along the way…Only one in four women is able to read and write. University is an impossible dream.”