The people of the poor nations are the losers in this arrangement. Macionis presentation of the factual situation of poverty in Third World countries goes a long way toward setting you up for accepting modernization theory despite its flaws. Technology is limited. Population growth is dramatic. Cultural patterns emphasize tradition.
Gender inequality is dramatic.
All of these point in one way or another toward the sorts of problems Rostow identifies as support for his modernization theory explanation of global inequality. In the developed nations, the technological development we so highly prize took several hundred years to develop. Thirty to fifty years is a short time in which to try to achieve what the developed nations achieved over several hundred years. While it is true that the more developed nations had to invent the technologies that less developed nations can now purchase without having to go through the developmental phases, purchasing newer technologies is quite expensive. The answer often has been by borrowing it.