How the West Grew Rich

"The perception of poverty as morally intolerable in a rich society had to await the emergence of a rich society." 

"Growth is, of course, a form of change, and growth is impossible when change is not permitted. And successful change requires a large measure of freedom to experiment. A grant of that kind of freedom costs a society's rulers their feeling of control... The great majority of societies, past and present, have not allowed it. Nor have they escaped from poverty."