Carlos Slim is a Mexican billionaire. When Acemoglu and Robinson published Why Nations Fail in 2012, Slim was the wealthiest man in the world. However, the authors note that Slim built his wealth by manipulating extractive institutions to his advantage—most importantly, he convinced his allies in the government to privatize Mexico’s telecommunications monopoly and sell it to him. The authors go on to argue that Slim stifles innovation and creative destruction by dodging antimonopoly laws through a legal loophole. In their first chapter, they contrast Slim’s path to riches with Bill Gates’s in order to show how entrepreneurs have very different incentives under extractive and inclusive institutions.
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Carlos Slim Character Timeline in Why Nations Fail
The timeline below shows where the character Carlos Slim appears in Why Nations Fail. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Chapter 1: So Close and Yet So Different
...contrast the two richest men in the world: the American Bill Gates and the Mexican Carlos Slim . Gates founded Microsoft, an innovative technology company. Despite Microsoft’s influential position in American society,...
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...would threaten their status—and since they have power, they can sometimes block those changes, like Carlos Slim does in Mexico. Therefore, while it focuses on poverty and prosperity, this book is really...
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Chapter 13: Why Nations Fail Today
...their companies with tariffs and give them huge loans. Much like the process that enriched Carlos Slim in Mexico, Egypt sold state-owned monopolies to private businessmen, who profited handsomely. Egypt’s extractive political...
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