The United States gives foreign aid in the billions of dollars. How? Obviously we do not send suitcases filled with dollars. Our largest foreign aid goes to Israel...in the amount of over $3 billion. So...how? Do they have to spend it here in the United States...or do we give them some kind of voucher that they can use to buy cars from Japan or South Korea? Does anyone here know for sure? How does it work?
We allow them to buy military hardware. This is actually called foreign aid. Very little is in cash transfers
This is a great question. Israel is an especially embarassing example of it if what Vegas said is true. I know for developing countries we provide foodstuffs in certain cases. Hopefully someone will come along and fill us all in on this mysterious process.
I appreciate the comments so far...but nothing authoritative. I suspect the money is all spent here...doing good for our economy. But if so, why are we not doing good for our economy by giving "domestic" aid...and having our people spend the money. Not trying to be nationalistic. We all have to help each other. But the process seems to be hidden from the public. Hoping someone has read something that clears it up with authority.
Extending credit, literally selling goods, changing rules and regulations to favor one country over another, adopting free trade agreements, etc. Those are some basic ideas.
There are several types of foreign aid programs. The most common is Foreign Military Sales where we either give credit for a country to buy equipment and maintenance programs. Another is providing civilian and military training. There are others such as letting a foreign country co-manufacture equipment. The whole thing gets quite complicated. The biggest screw up is not using zero-base budgeting. Instead of making a country start from scratch every year, they simply add a "common growth factor for the following year. I was once responsible for a FMS and training sales budget in a foreign country.
How's this... Going back to the old days of cyclamates (remember them?) which were determined by the FDA to be carcinogenic on the basis of studies, there were candy companies stuck with millions and millions of dollars worth of candy that was now known to be poisonous and they couldn't sell it by law. So to save their butts the government bought up that candy and sent it to third world countries as "Foreign Aid" to be given to their starving people. Just think: diet candy, and poisonous at that, for starving people! Similarly, the defense industry, like most other large industries, produces far more than they can ever sell. Well, you know that huge defense budget we all love? Much of it is used to buy those excess weapons from defense manufacturers and then give it to other countries like Israel. This is at least welcomed by those other countries, unlike cyclamates. And it keeps the defense contractors profitable. It also is used to persuade the receiving country to permit U.S. military bases within their borders. The Marshall Plan was a bonanza for large corporations. Foreign "Aid" is also used to get other countries to do what the U.S. government wants. And in some cases goods are sold cheaply to other countries for local currency, and then loaned back to those countries at interest. There are good things accomplished by our Foreign Aid too, like combatting AIDS, but too often it becomes an impediment to real advancement of receiving countries. More here: https://www.exposingtruth.com/foreign-aid/
Ah government...I should have known the entire thing was not much more than a carnival for corruption. Actually, come to think of it, there have been a few scandals involving the IMF and Worldbank. what a shame.
"New research shows that developing countries send trillions of dollars more to the west than the other way around." https://www.theguardian.com/global-...ies-develop-rich-countries?CMP=share_btn_link We should be better than this. But greed wins out?
