Defining the ability to pay
Madeleine Bunting wrote a powerful column in favour of aid this weekend.
I want to see an end to aid: it should be replaced by taxes collected by local governments on income they can generate within their communities. But the pre-conditions for that to happen are, as yet, not in existence. Fort a start we stack all the odds against the aid recipient countries. Whilst that happens aid is essential.
Bunting refers to to philosopher Peter Singer, who she says:
acknowledges that some aid goes astray, and that some aid is not very effective. But he turns that argument on its head: so what, if the cost to you has been so little – only the price of a meal in a restaurant or a new pair of shoes? Such is the affluence of the west, arguments about the cost of aid are irrelevant – we can afford it.
And he puts the threshold very low: anyone who can afford to buy a bottled or canned drink where there is clean tap water available has money they do not need.
My emphasis added, but reflect on it: isn’t this a definition of our ability to redistribute to those in need? And if so, our capacity to do so is enormous. It’s one of a number of very powerful arguments on this capacity now developing, and of both the need and beenfit from doing so.
I’ll be returning to the theme.
