Luckily, for him at least, people are coming up with fresh ideas for how citizens of the Third World can be put to productive use by wealthy Westerners. Mikhai Kossar of blockchain gaming consultant Wolves DAO (opens in new tab), for instance, suggested that they could be added to the background of videogames for the amusement of other, presumably wealthier players.

"With the cheap labor of a developing country, you could use people in the Philippines as NPCs, real-life NPCs in your game," Kossar said, apparently seriously. They would "just populate the world, maybe do a random job or just walk back and forth, fishing, telling stories, a shopkeeper, anything is really possible."