U.S. looks out for own interests- and why not?
Via Captain’s Quarters, the Guardian newspaper in the UK is outrageously outraged that the United States has a tendency to increase the share of its foreign aid to those countries who are currently serving on the United Nations Security Council.
The US uses its aid budget to bribe those countries which have a vote in the United Nations security council, giving them 59 per cent more cash in years when they have a seat, according to research by economists.In a detailed analysis of 50 years of data, Harvard University’s Ilyana Kuziemko and Eric Werker provide the clearest evidence yet that money is used by the council’s richest member to grease the wheels of diplomacy.
Well, no duh! Why would we increase our aid to countries that have no say in world affairs, as opposed to those that do - and therefore influence them to vote favorable for U.S. initiatives. Before any of the Bush-haters jump on this, note that this is 50 years of data - so we’ve been doing this for a long, damn time. To continue…
When there is a controversial vote in prospect, the premium for countries with a security council seat is even higher. US aid surges by as much as 170 per cent, bringing in a £23m windfall, while the UN spends an extra £4m.
Of course, the Libs of the world are also outrageously outraged:
Anti-poverty campaigners reacted angrily to the findings. ‘Aid should go to the people who need it, not as a political sweetener,’ said Duncan Green of Oxfam. ‘In recent years most rich countries have been making progress on this, but showering bribes on developing countries just because they sit on the UN security council is clearly a step backwards.’Charities often complain that the US uses its aid as a political tool, and this new evidence of what the authors call ‘vote-buying’ will raise fears about whether the surge of aid money that was promised at last year’s Gleneagles G8 summit will be fairly spent.
David Woodward, of the New Economics Foundation, who is writing about the paper for a forthcoming edition of the Lancet, said the findings suggest the UN should be radically reformed.
‘As long as one country wields such influence, there will always have a degree of control over what goes on, and they will be likely to abuse that.’
So, how about we just shut off outside funding altogether? There’s plenty of people in the U.S. who don’t think we should be doling out billions in welfare checks to the world, and plenty of other people who want us out of the United Nations, period.
There are also many - to include people from the regions that receive the aid - who believe that foreign aid is just welfare, and puts countries in a position where the money either goes to corrupt government bureaucrats and politicians, or de-motivates the country to improve its own situation. Why make an effort to improve your country, when someone else keeps giving you money? (You could say the same thing about welfare recipients here.)
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