U.N. Report Cites U.S. and Japan as the Least Generous Donors,
read the headline in the September 8 New York Times. The article
went on to criticize U.S. foreign aid in advance of next weeks
United Nations summit, continuing a media push for the U.S. to
commit billions of dollars in additional foreign aid.
The Times piece, written by Celia W. Dugger, cited the
United Nations annual Human Development Report and explained that
While crediting the United States with being the world's largest
donor, the report points out that among the world's richest
countries, America is second to last in aid as a portion of its
national income, with Italy bringing up the rear.
Duggers story quoted only one U.S. spokesman who
disputed the idea that the United States is stingy. Had Dugger
gone deeper, reality might have presented itself. The report the
article cited also strongly promoted a socialist agenda of more
equitable income distribution and took potshots at both capitalism
and free market economics.
The report ties in to the U.N. Millennium Development
Goals, which attempt to mandate that each industrialized nation give
0.7 percent of Gross National Product to foreign aid. In the case of
the United States, that would be 0.7 percent of roughly $12.4
trillion or nearly $87 billion each year. According to a Dec. 28,
2004, CNN.com article, The United States' overall foreign aid
commitment is around 0.2 percent of its gross national product.
But theres a problem with that comparison. Aid money
pledged by the U.S. government must come only from the government
which means its a share of the federal budget, not American GNP.
GNP is a measurement of productivity and income in the public and
private sectors combined. To promise that money, the government most
likely would have to raise taxes.
Thus, the number that the United Nations uses to
compare countries is heavily skewed toward nations where the
governments budget is a much larger percentage of GNP. It
specifically ignores the way most Americans choose to give through
charitable contributions. A June 2005 report from the Hudson
Institute revealed that private U.S. donors gave at least $62
billion to developing countries in 2003. That was three-and-a-half
times the total of Official Development Assistance the U.S.
government handed out that year.
The Times story glossed over some notable aspects of
the UN report including:
-
Numerous
mentions that the worlds governments have pledged to meet the
Millennium Development Goals, despite U.S. statements that
disagree with this claim.
The study
quoted left-wing supporters of big government socialism from
Nelson Mandela to Franklin Delano Roosevelt. The Roosevelt
quote stated: The test of our progress is not whether we add
more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we
provide enough for those who have too little.
The report made
several references to socialist shifts in distribution of
income, including one example of a cost of $300 billion for
lifting 1 billion people living on less than $1 a day above
the extreme poverty line threshold.
The study did
acknowledge that the United States, the worlds largest aid
donor, has increased aid by $8 billion since 2000 and is now
the worlds largest donor to Sub-Saharan Africa.
In the section
titled Counter-aguments countered, the U.N. report cited
free market theorist F.A. Hayeks position that free markets
determine the appropriate allocation of wealth and assets
before attempting to undermine that position.
Claiming that
such government spending is affordable, the report argued for
$7 billion needed to provide clean water as less than
Americans spend on elective corrective surgery.
