December 20, 2018
-Abolish Peace Corps-(maybe sunset or transfer to nonprofit).
The Peace Corps: A lot of bucks for very little bang, Brookings, October 16 2017
However, at approximately $56,500 per volunteer per year, the Peace Corps is one of the most expensive civilian overseas programs funded by the federal government and nearly twice as expensive as the Fulbright U.S. Student Program. The program’s cost ($410 million annually) coupled with its inconsistent development track record and the agency’s insistence that it operate independently from U.S. foreign policy should raise questions for Congress about whether an entirely taxpayer-funded model is sustainable and a good use of limited resources.
In 1971, Brent Ashabranner, the former Deputy Director of the Peace Corps suggested that the agency could be run by a private foundation.
Today there are approximately 220,000 members of the National Peace Corps Association, a network for returned Peace Corps volunteers, who could serve as a potential donor base. Included in that number are Reed Hastings (founder and CEO of Netflix), …
Do Africans Want Peace Corps Volunteers? Forbes, July 4, 2018
One major thing to look at is how locals are involved. Are they being trained to run it themselves or are they always in support roles while the foreigners run it? I get the feeling that a lot are just altruistic projects for people to come take a year off and work, but they aren’t really committed to changing the local situation fully, which requires expanding your scope, which oftentimes people aren’t willing to do. For example, if a health NGO is not addressing the poverty that’s causing the health problems, then it’s just a Band-Aid. People with TB or HIV are unlikely to get better if their financial situation doesn’t improve.
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– Aid monetization (allow selling of US food aid to fund other programs)
Monetization: Market-based food aid that works, The Hill, January 30, 2015-author with International Relief and Development, 80% of IRD budget from USAID. IRD renamed https://blumont.org/
“monetization.” This is a process in which nongovernmental organizations or recipient governments sell U.S. food aid commodities through local marketing systems to bolster supplies. NGOs then use the proceeds to fund food security and agriculture development projects….
The case for food aid reform,AEI, October 27, 2017
The solution: three simple reforms to the emergency food aid legislation at no additional cost to U.S. taxpayers. These changes would allow the United States to feed up to an additional ten million people in these countries, improve peace and stability, and stem the flow of new refugees.
The first reform would end the “food sourcing” mandate requiring…(USAID) and … (USDA) to obtain almost all food aid from the United States…
AEI, October 27, 2017
– Cargo Food Preferences Aid
The second reform would end the “cargo preference” mandate, which requires that at least half of all food aid be shipped on U.S. flagged vessels, at freight rates often 40% higher than internationally competitive rates.
Combined, these two changes would reduce the costs of delivering aid by over $300 million a year,
An additional $70 million a year could be saved by ending the bizarre practice known as “monetization.” Monetization involves giving food commodities to non-government organizations to resell.
The process wastes between 30 and 50 cents of every monetization dollar, …
…the intensive lobbying of a few U.S. shipping companies who profit from both restrictions and claim that their ships are essential to national security. …
In fact, the United States has not used a single food aid ship for military purposes in the last four decades, even in the mid-2000s at the height of the Iraq war.
Key economic point: food is traded globally so source doesn’t matter (if market price paid):
A second argument for sourcing food aid from the United States is that American farmers benefit from the sourcing requirement. However, as Senator Corker recently noted, food aid represents less than 0.1% of U.S. food production. Moreover, most of the commodities used for aid —including corn and wheat— are traded globally. As a result, sourcing food aid domestically has no impact on the prices that U.S. farmers receive.
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– How to write/deal with aid for countries that support terror networks (economic destabilizing, Arab spring)
Key problem is lack of economic freedom in Islamic countries. U.S. policy has been focused on military and infrastructure aid, and transition to democracy programs. But would better be focused on “legal and economic empowerment of the poor;”
• Unlikely Heroes of the Arab Spring
• The economic roots of the Arab Spring
Also, many posts on informal economy and Hernando de Soto research
Demographics also key. Over half population in many countries under 25.
– Aid options for Myanmar/Bangladesh
Part of broader problem of international refugees.
Economic freedom for refugee camps is proposal for Middle East (Jordan, for example)
• Startup Cities or Foreign Aid for Fish, Food, and Infrastructure?
• The Refugee Camp with Millions of Impoverished Refugees
• Stories of Small Places: Freedom, Choice, Governance
Contrast that story with the market-based refugee camp profiled in Refugee Economics in Uganda: Challenging Popular Myths about Refugees (Oxford Refugee Studies Centre, 2014) and their 2016 book Refugee Economies: Forced Displacement and Development. Instead of taking millions in handouts from international aid agencies and charities, Uganda’s Self-Reliance Strategy protects refugees rights and opportunities for enterprise: