What Aid Really Is

Today I read Nicholas Kristof's column, "Bono, Foreign Aid and Skeptics". He presented the complexities of aid relief well, and was careful not to gloss over any of the issues. I would consider myself one of those skeptics of direct foreign aid, due to the rock-n-roll economics that some of its policies are based on, but I found myself agreeing with much of what Kristof said.

That is, until I read the following passage:

...when we pay a few hundred dollars for fistula surgery so that a teenage girl no longer will leak urine or feces for the rest of her life, that operation may not stimulate economic growth. But no one who sees such a girl’s happiness after surgery can doubt that such aid is effective, for it truly saves a human being.

As a liberal-minded economics major, I found this appalling. Not the part about aid creating happiness and therefore being effective, but the seemingly innocent statement that a surgery like this "may not stimulate economic growth."

This surgery will most definitely stimulate economic growth. Most would look at this act of aid as a handout, but I see it as an investment in human capital. By creating a better life for this teenager, and substantially lengthening it, this person is free to live as she pleases, while participating in the local and global economy.

People do not like to think of human life in potential dollar amounts, but I think it is necessary when dealing with the type of people that run our world. If people continue to look at aid as charity for helpless, destitute people half-way around the world, it will never effectively solve problems. Aid cannot be useful until it is seen for what it really should be, an investment in humanity and therefore the global economy.

Note: I submitted these comments to Nicholas Kristof on his blog, On the Ground. If he responds, I will post it here.