Isn't this a no brainer?

[laxfan25]

yeah but is all our foreign aid getting funneled through the UN? Maybe we just dont give the UN a lot of money. According to the Greenbook, in 2004 we gave over $26 Billion dollars for foreign economic development through the US Agency for International Development.

http://www.usaid.gov/

No, the USAID funding is not distributed thru the UN, it goes from the US gov't directly to foreign countries, where most often it has to be distributed through specified agencies. One exception is aid to Israel. From the American-Israeli Cooperative Enterprise;

Israel does receive aid on more favorable terms than other nations. For example, all economic aid is given directly to the Israeli government rather than allocated under a specific program. Also, starting in 1982, Israel began to receive all its economic aid in a lump sum early in the fiscal year instead of in quarterly installments as is done for other countries. Israel is not required to provide an accounting of how the funds are used.

And if 1/10 of 1% is tons of money to you, how can I argue? Doesn't really seem to be close to tithing. Those foreign aid dollars reported don't include military aid around the world, which dwarfs that number. Of course most of that money flows to defense contractors here in the US, so it's good for the ecnomy.

[StrykerFSU]

I'd like to keep all U.S. money as far from the UN as possible...that whole Oil-For-Food thing worked out really well.

[Sonny]

laxfan25,

You have already admitted that the US gives more dollars then any other country in the world. I would even argue that that we do too much around the globe and not enough to secure our own borders and solve domestic problems. (But that is a different argument).... But only a liberal would argue that isn't enough. It's never enough for the left.

[laxfan25]

Yes, we contribute more dollars than any other country - but we happen to be far and away the richest country in the world. I also pointed out that as a percentage of GDP we are the lowest of the wealthy countries.

I also feel that foreign aid for development increases our reputation and global standing, and also improves conditions in countries where economic depravation may be feeding the desire to emigrate to the US.

[Beta]

Yes, we contribute more dollars than any other country - but we happen to be far and away the richest country in the world. I also pointed out that as a percentage of GDP we are the lowest of the wealthy countries.

I also feel that foreign aid for development increases our reputation and global standing, and also improves conditions in countries where economic depravation may be feeding the desire to emigrate to the US.

We've been sending aid to many countries for a while now and even in the countries we send it to we're "The Great Devil". I don't think there's anything this country as a whole can do to make people like us. Jealousy turns into Hate and that'll never change.

[Zeuslax]

"The Great Devil". I don't think there's anything this country as a whole can do to make people like us. Jealousy turns into Hate and that'll never change.

You think "they" are jealous of us? Lets put some of this into perspective. The avg. person makes $50,000 a year, 1% of that is $500 dollars, 1/10 of that is..........$50.00 dollars. I donated more than that last week to NPR, a CMU T-shirt drive, and a work candy drive.

[Sonny]

"The Great Devil". I don't think there's anything this country as a whole can do to make people like us. Jealousy turns into Hate and that'll never change.

You think "they" are jealous of us? Lets put some of this into perspective. The avg. person makes $50,000 a year, 1% of that is $500 dollars, 1/10 of that is..........$50.00 dollars. I donated more than that last week to NPR, a CMU T-shirt drive, and a work candy drive.

Your argument is flawed Zeuslax. You are comparing pre-tax dollars (salary) with after tax dollars charity contributions. Someone who makes $50,000 in this country only gets to take home about 60 - 65% of it after local, state, and federal taxes.

[Zeuslax]

Sonny your right, but the math is still the same, and the total is still low. Let say you bring home 31,000 of the 50 it works out to be $31 dollars.

PS in this case I happen to agree with both sides. I just feel like we shouldn't spend money in other areas. IE developing a new generation of nuclear weapons.

[Sonny]

Sonny your right, but the math is still the same, and the total is still low. Let say you bring home 31,000 of the 50 it works out to be $31 dollars.

And that same person has already "contributed" ~19,000 to local, state, and federal governments in taxes. That total is very HIGH.

[laxfan25]

Yippee! The gov't just announced they are cutting all non-military foreign aid from the budget. Your hypothetical $19,000 tax bill has just been reduced to - $18,842 (assuming 1% of the fed tax is for international aid. Also assuming that 83% of that tax bill was Fed).
Meantime, $1,600 went to just pay interest on the national credit card, $5,200 went to cover Grandma's Social Security and Medicare, $3,166 went to active military and homeland security spending (that doesn't include benefits for the retired military), and a similar $3,166 went to entitlements such as Medicaid and veterans benefits.
There is $2,700 in federal discretionary spending in there as well, which actually has been getting reduced in the budgets (things like education, grants to states - which has caused major problems in state budgets).
The federal government is the only governmental budgeting organization that does not have to produce a balanced budget. States do, cities do.
It makes it real easy then to run for President on a platform of "Taxes are too high - I pledge to cut them!" How brave. I could be real popular too if I went into the bar and bought everyone drinks on a credit card that I would never have to pay.
So who's ox are we going to gore? We have two options - cut spending or increase taxes. Since our tax burden is "too high" - where are we going to get the real cuts that can have an impact? Medicare/Medicaid costs are soaring with the increase in healthcare costs - how do we rein that in? How do we provide healthcare for the millions that can't afford it? Just let 'em die?
Those budget numbers don't even include the off-budget funding that is paying for our efforts in Afghanistan and Iraq.
Not a pretty picture, and one that no politician wants to face up to, since it's easy to just put it off until our kids and grandkids have to pay the bill. Much easier to just say "Let's get rid of the death tax!" There's our answer.

[Zeuslax]

Laxfan25 wrote:

Those budget numbers don't even include the off-budget funding that is paying for our efforts in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Lets go a step further by throwing a hypothetical out there. What if we had all of our troops (160,000) in Afganistan, we didn't go into Iraq, and we spent 3 billion dollars in aid in that country. How would we be perceived? What kind of good would it have done? Now we're hearing that due to our lack of funds, and our effort to get the job done there, that the populace is sitting on the sidelines waiting to see who's side to take. Our own military and assessments said we have 5 months at the most before the populace govt loses the people. International aid goes far and in many instances brings us into a better light. Especially with today's current events.

[Kyle Berggren]

Not a pretty picture, and one that no politician wants to face up to, since it's easy to just put it off until our kids and grandkids have to pay the bill. Much easier to just say "Let's get rid of the death tax!" There's our answer.

I was under the impression that we don't actually include the "death tax" proceeds in our budgeting, as well as the vast majority of taxes that come from IRA withdrawls above the RMD levels. So in essence, we have billions of added taxes that come in off the record, & we still can't come close to cutting that debt down.

Finance & the world economy are very interesting to me, & 50 years from now, who knows what it will look like, but we're not in good shape. China pegged their currency to ours, oil is currently valued in Dollars (God forbid they go to the Euro), other economies are growing stronger while we stagnate, the list goes on & on, but we're not the financial powerhouse we'd like to think we are... I believe China has somewhere around 500 billion in USD. Now, granted their currency is pegged to ours, but imagine the influx of those monies & the inflation it would create. It's an interesting discussion, but not one many politicians are willing to have.

[laxfan25]

Kyle,
I believe that all taxes are recorded under the revenue side, including estate taxes. One interesting thing that does happen in the budget is that Social Security taxes received are counted as revenue, even though they are really a down payment on future payouts. Without that little subterfuge (which is similar to the accounting practices that took down Enron and led to legal charges) the deficit would be much worse than it appears.

On the China issue, the biggest factor is that they are the ones financing our deficit spending by buying up T-Bills. They hold a tremendous amount of power because of that. If they decided to stop buying our debt we would really be in deep doo-doo.

[Sonny]

Honest question for ya laxfan25.... How much of my paycheck should I be able to keep each week? And how much should go to taxes?

[Kyle Berggren]

"The Great Devil". I don't think there's anything this country as a whole can do to make people like us. Jealousy turns into Hate and that'll never change.

You think "they" are jealous of us? Lets put some of this into perspective. The avg. person makes $50,000 a year, 1% of that is $500 dollars, 1/10 of that is..........$50.00 dollars. I donated more than that last week to NPR, a CMU T-shirt drive, and a work candy drive.

The percentages are fine to look at, but our government isn't a person, it's a business & should be ran as such. Corporations don't say, well, you get 1% of revenue, you get 2% and leave it at that.... (yes I know that does happen occasionally, but typically its a dollar budget). We're spending money we don't have, & spreading good around the world, with money we don't have, while our citizens want more support from our government, it should be an outrage. We're financially unresponsible.

I also donate a much larger percentage than what we're talking about, but I do it by choice. Don't take my money from me, then give it to someone else, all the while wanting to take more of my money.