The Nature of Mass Poverty proceeds from the author's conviction that most explanations of conditions in poor countries do not explain. They reflect, instead, the experience of the rich countries. Or they create cause out of cure. Capital and technical expertise being available from the rich countries, shortage of these becomes the cause of poverty in the poor. Galbraith discusses a variety of different explanations for poverty, e.g. climate, mountains, access to harbours, raw materials, culture or political system. He points out that the effect of communism on economics was rather limited the train basically being the same, the relative differences in economic status kept unchanged as well, (Eastern) Germany and Czechoslovakia leading and Romania being the last. The same applies to Asia, where "being Chinese" had a greater effect on local wealth than climate or local political system. The Author then lays out two arguments with regards to mass poverty. First, he contends that many of the causes attributed to the conditions of the rural poor (governmental corruption, lack of education) are in fact both a cause and effect of poverty. The poor being perfectly adapted to their labour-intensive work, an accommodation to poverty makes this culturally ingrained and the poor and their offspring tend to stay in that vicious circle. The author also points out that most solutions to poverty from the West (capital investment, improved organization and technology, increased agricultural production) are those the developed nations can provide–but often fail to consider local accommodation to poverty Drawing on his observations in postwar Western Germany, which faced an enormous amount of displaced persons after the war, he concludes that emigration was not a problem but in combination with the high level of education, it contributed significantly to the economic success and reconstruction effort. Galbraith recommends for India improvement in general education on the one hand and focused help for those determined to escape the cycle of poverty. In general, as for developed countries, emigration and embracing other cultures are not seen as a problem but a sign of action and willingness to escape unsustainable status.