In 1991, long before Lawrence Summers claimed, while president of Harvard, that women were innately disinclined toward science, he served as chief economist of the World Bank. In this capacity, too, he distinguished himself. “I’ve always thought that under-populated countries in Africa are vastly UNDER-polluted,” he wrote to his colleagues in a memo. “I think the economic logic behind dumping a load of toxic waste in the lowest wage country is impeccable and we should face up to that.” After all, he reasoned, the rest of the world would not lose out on much money or value if poor people with shorter life spans sickened and died; it would be far more profitable to keep healthier populations with higher incomes alive. (Summers later told a Senate committee that the memo was satirical and “never intended in any way as a serious policy recommendation.”) José Lutzenberger, Brazil’s environment minister, replied to the memo: “Your reasoning is perfectly logical but totally insane.”