Mexico's Missing Prosperity.

Editor,

Robert J. Samuelson might find answers to his questions regarding "Mexico's missing prosperity" on pages 103-104 in "A Brief History of Neoliberalism," by David Harvey (Oxford University Press, 2005).

These pages discuss the "tequila crisis" of 1995, which occurred when the U.S. Federal Reserve raised interest rates, crippling Mexico with impossible interest payments on foreign capital that had entered the country under neoliberal "reforms." NAFTA followed, resulting in the selling of Mexico's assets to foreign investors at bargain basement prices. This, with other neoliberalizations of the Mexican economy, produced 24 Mexican billionaires, one of whom is Carlos Slim, the 24th richest person in the world according to Forbes magazine. "His strategy for cell phone service [according to Harvey] became renowned: capture and monopolize the high-density and affluent markets and leave the low-density and poorer markets without service."

Mexico's missing prosperity is a product of the concentration of Mexico's wealth in the hands of foreign capitalists and a few inordinately wealthy, predatory Mexican investors.