Heaven forbid anyone should follow the American model.
If I remember correctly, this is a program that loans money to destitute people in order for them to start small, at home businesses. They loan money for things like a stove so that a woman can make money selling rice cakes to workers, or sewing machines so that they can make clothes to sell. I think this is a good program, if it is the one I am thinking of.
This IS the American model. Grameen is really about a close as you could get to pure capitalism in its most benevolent and optimistic light as you could possibly get. Yunus, who has a PhD from Vanderbilt right here in Nashville, started lending small amounts of money to villagers in his native Bangladesh, and found, that they used this capital productively, improved their lives, and PAID THE MONEY BACK, unlike their government.
Here is a quotation from Yunus, who should be a hero to Freepers:
“Grameen believes that charity is not an answer to poverty. It only helps poverty to continue,” wrote Yunus in September 2004. “It creates dependency and takes away individual initiative to break through the wall of poverty. Unleashing of energy and creativity in each human being is the answer to poverty.”