Are terrorists the outcome of poverty?

A common theme in the public discourse is that people with low levels of income and education have little to lose, and may have higher propensities to become terrorists who undertake suicidal acts.

This idea is not supported by real-world data.

Prof. Kreuger, a former Chair of the White House Council of Economic Advisors, is the lead author of Education, Poverty and Terrorism: Is There a Causal Connection? This study related to suicidal attacks focused on the propensity to join Hizbullah. (Hizbullah denies that it is a terrorist organization, and calls itself ‘Islamic Resistance in Lebanon’, which aims to counter ‘Israeli terrorism.’)

The analysis is based on combination of two datasets:

• individual data for 129 Hizbullah fighters who died in action from 1982 to 1994, collected by an Israeli professor, and
• individual data for a large number of Lebanese persons from the Lebanese Population and Housing Survey conducted in 1996.

Using standard econometric techniques, the authors concluded lower levels of income do not increase the propensity to join Hizbullah; to the contrary, a 30-percentage point reduction in poverty is associated with a 15 percent increase in the probability of joining Hizbullah. Similarly, a 30-percentage point increase in secondary school enrollment is associated with an 8 percent increase in the probability of joining Hizbullah participation.

In short, contrary to expectations, higher incomes and higher levels of education increase the probability of joining Hizbullah. Other studies have similarly concluded that terrorists are just as likely to be economically well off and educated as poor and uneducated.

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Keep in mind that the terrorists who flew the planes on 9/11 were far from poor — they were well-to-do educated people.

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The New York Times reported in March 2016 carried an article with this title: “Who Will Become a Terrorist? Research Yields Few Clues.” Key points:

• Despite millions of dollars of government-sponsored research, and a much-publicized White House pledge to find answers, there is still nothing close to a consensus on why someone becomes a terrorist.
• murky science seems to imply that nearly anyone is a potential terrorist. Some studies suggest that terrorists are likely to be educated or extroverted; others say uneducated recluses are at risk. Many studies seem to warn of the adolescent condition, singling out young, impatient men with a sense of adventure who are “struggling to achieve a sense of selfhood.”

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However, the terrorists who attacked Mumbai in 2008 were poor, uneducated people. This report says that the only surviving terrorist Ajmal Kassab (who was later hanged after a court trial) was a school drop-out. His poor family lived in a small village in Pakistan.

In short, poverty may lead to people becoming terrorists, but many terrorists are not poor.