At 03:44 PM 6/5/2003 -0400, you wrote:
These are two separate things. We can imagine the public good of "a functional Africa" that will suffer from the traditional public goods problems. But, I don't think that you can say the same for the plethora of "save the children" type charities that assure you that a child's life will be saved for your $20/mth. The benefits from that are largely internalized -- the donor gets to feel better about himself for having saved the life, etc. The contribution to any public good is next to nil -- the continent remains disfunctional and there is still rampant starvation and war. But, the donor has personally made one person better off who wouldn't likely have been made better off absent the contribution. Don't think we can invoke public goods here.
