Economic Development Reduces Terrorism

So says Gary Becker. He writes:

Terrorist groups rely on populations that are sympathetic to their cause to hide and protect their members. They also recruit disaffected youth in significant numbers who are willing to commit suicide to destroy enemies. Just as economic progress greatly affects family structure and the amount of freedom available, it also sharply reduces the willingness of people to hide or otherwise protect terrorists because they have more to lose if they are caught. Although leaders of terrorist organizations usually come from more educated classes, these organizations rely on numerous foot soldiers to do a lot of the dirty work. They are generally recruited from younger and less educated groups. It becomes much harder to recruit many of these soldiers when good jobs are available, especially if these recruits are asked to commit suicide.

This seems to contradict Alan Krueger's findings, though. I've only skimmed that book and a separate piece he wrote on the relationship between poverty and terrorism, but I think the overall gist is that he finds little correlation between a country's poverty and stage of development and the incidence of terrorism. But, I nonetheless think Becker is correct that as a country grows, and its people become wealthier, the costs of terrorism mostly fall. We're talking about an income range, though, which may not be entirely convex.