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What Can't a Billion Dollars Buy?

2018-02-13 · letter vlog · John, Bill Gates · 4:00 · watch on YouTube

Topic: Global development (also: Science & nature) · mode: Personal essay · tags: timely hook, self promotion

Pegged to the 2018 Gates annual letter and Crash Course Statistics, John argues that $4.6 billion a year cannot solve the world's biggest problems, but, as Bill Gates told him, new tools and delivery systems magnify spending, so how each of us uses money, attention and time shapes the world.

What is said

The parts of the video and what is said in each (★ — how much it matters to the video).

00:00:00 — Crash Course Statistics and why humans are bad at big numbers (100 trillion microorganisms)

  • ★★ John says Adriene Hill has just started hosting a new Crash Course series on statistics, whose episode Mathematical Thinking helped him understand differences between big numbers. — 00:00:01 · Crash Course
  • ★★ John says humans are notoriously bad at big numbers: he doesn't really understand the difference between a billion and a trillion. — 00:00:10
  • ★★ John says over a hundred trillion microorganisms live in or on his body, a fact he processes poorly. — 00:00:18

00:00:28 — Big budgets in context: US foreign aid, the Gates Foundation's $4.6 billion and what it can't buy (and Coutinhos)

  • ★★ John says the US spends, by the broadest definition, around $50 billion a year on foreign aid, a lot of money but just over 1% of the federal budget. — 00:00:33 · United States
  • ★★★ John says the Gates Foundation donated $4.6 billion in 2016, which split among all Americans would give each about 13 dollars. — 00:00:42
  • ★★ John says $4.6 billion a year cannot pay for enough teachers for all inadequately taught kids worldwide, or for primary health care for everyone. — 00:00:56

00:01:13 — The Gates annual letter's ten tough questions, and John's own: are we completely screwed?

  • ★★ John says the letter's question whether saving kids' lives will lead to overpopulation is easy to answer: no, it won't. — 00:01:25
  • ★★ John says the Gates annual letter, which he and Hank have followed for years, this year (2018) answers ten tough questions, and is always worth reading. — 00:01:39
  • ★★★ John asks whether, if $4.6 billion a year isn't enough to solve the world's biggest problems, we are just completely screwed. — 00:01:42

00:01:54 — Bill Gates on magnification by new tools and delivery systems; Green Revolution, Gates Foundation priorities, the US AIDS programme

  • ★★ John asked Bill Gates about this on a phone call a couple of weeks ago; Gates first pointed out that not every dollar spent has equal impact. — 00:01:54

  • ★★ John defines the Green Revolution as a huge rise in crop yields from better irrigation, fertilizers and seeds; by the late 1960s it raised available calories per person by 25%. — 00:02:14

    “The Green Revolution was a huge increase in agricultural yields due to better irrigation techniques”

  • ★★★ Bill Gates says two things magnify impact: inventing a new tool (a magic seed or vaccine) and a delivery system, such as good primary health care or educating farmers. — 00:02:28 · vaccine

  • ★★★ John agrees: breakthrough technologies can transform, and better systems can be disproportionately effective because they keep producing results after funding stops. — 00:02:50 · aid effectiveness
  • ★★ John says this is why the Gates Foundation invests in better toilets and new vaccines, but also in primary health care systems. — 00:03:04 · vaccine
  • ★★ John says it is also why US foreign aid, when spent well, can go a really long way. — 00:03:10 · United States
  • ★★★ John says the US AIDS treatment programme begun under George W. Bush cost a few billion dollars a year and, despite flaws like abstinence-only focus, a 2009 study found it saved 1.2 million lives. — 00:03:16 · United States

00:03:35 — How we use money, attention and time shapes the world; 26,097 days; sign-off

  • ★★★ John says that, though we probably lack a billion dollars, how each of us uses our resources, money but also attention and time, shapes the world we end up sharing. — 00:03:35
  • ★★ John says the average human born today will live to see 26,097 days, a big number that is also very small, and urges: let's make them count. — 00:03:47

Threads in this video

Mentioned

Central: Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation · Bill Gates · Development aid

Also: People: Donald Trump · George W. Bush · Philippe Coutinho

Projects: Crash Course

Works: Gates Foundation annual letter

Organizations: Liverpool FC

Terms: doobly-doo

Concepts: aid effectiveness · HIV/AIDS · human overpopulation · life expectancy · malnutrition · microorganism · primary health care · sanitation · statistics · vaccine

Places: United States

Events: Green Revolution

Policies: President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief

Only in the description or credits: Adriene Hill · human microbiome · Melinda French Gates

Also centred on Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation: Are Poor Countries Doomed? · Baby Names: Thoughts from Rural Ethiopia

Also centred on Bill Gates: Exciting Announcements and Mosquito-Borne Illnesses · Bill Gates and John Green Discuss Global Health · It's a Pizzamas Miracle! (Pizzamas Day 2)

Also centred on Development aid: This Is Not Normal

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