The wealth gap between 1st world countries and 3rd world countries seems to be increasing. How can we reduce this gap? Do you think that developed countries have a duty to assist developing countries in every way?

The wealth gap is a topic that has been around for a while, with a fair amount of discussion having been made around the topic, below, I will attempt to explain my views on it and how it can be addressed. To start off the discussion we must identify the problem, wealth. Tounderstand this, we must look at the deficits that have occurred over the years. 3rd world countries rely on their natural resources to keep their economy alive. Meaning natural resources such as gold, oil, gas and spices are the main source of economic exports and income. Historically these economies traded internally or with neighbours for what was deemed fair trade value, this hasn’t been the case in recent years due to a few policy changes that have occurred. Gold used to be the standard in which global trade was based on due to the abundance of the resources in western “1st world countries. ” However, when these minerals started to run out, discoveries of mineral reserves were found in 3rd world countries. This resulted in policy changes. President Nixon in the 1970’s changed the trade base from gold to the United States dollar, a big power move because now all of the minerals had no value unless they could be traded for the United States dollar or equivalent foreign exchange – thus putting the wealth base on an overseas entity rather than the country of origin. It doesn’t end there, if these third world countries didn’t agree with the policy or trade values, sanctions of trade were placed on the countries, forcing compliance, and thus increasing the wealth gap due to the unfair trade value of how much the minerals were being acquired for and sold. The solution to reducing the wealth gap is allowing fair trade values to become normal and reduce unfair practises and exploitation. 1st world countries have a role to play in this and it could be as simple as policy change and welcoming 3rd world countries to the table to include them in trades rather than exploiting the value.