The community-insurance obligation is simultaneously a benefit and a curse: in the absence of formal insurance, mutual obligation insures everyone against bad shocks, but it is precisely that obligation to share that makes individual saving impossible.

causalpending

Speaker

Michael Munger

Evidence Quote

they're one of the big norms is insurance that it's understood that the community takes care of people who need... but that's part of the reason that it's so hard to save

Source

Mike Munger on Microfinance, Savings, and Poverty 04/18/2011EconTalk
Created: 6/17/2026, 10:29:24 AM

My Notes

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