The Washington Post again committed the cardinal sin of not putting budget numbers in context. It ran an article today touting the doubling of aid to Africa during the Bush administration. While this is mostly good news for the people of the region (restrictons on funding for items like condoms and the usual cronyism make the aid less useful than it might otherwise be), it would be helpful to readers if the article put the money involved in some perspective. The current aid level of about $4 billion comes to about $5 per African. That's helpful, but not exactly a windfall. More importantly people should not be deluded into thinking that this aid is a big deal for the U.S. government. The current appropriation is equal to a bit more than 0.16 percent of federal spending. In other words, we spend just under $9,000 per person, about $14 of this money goes to people in Africa. Since a large portion of the public thinks that foreign aid comprises a large portion of their tax bill, a bit of context would be very helpful in educating the public. (Brad DeLong got to this one before me -- caught me napping.)
--Dean Baker
