Foreign Aid is a Farce Christopher J. Spradling

Choose an issue of importance to you—the issue could be personal, school related, local, political, or international in scope—and write an essay in which you explain the significance of that issue to yourself, your family, your community, or your generation.

Foreign aid is a farce.

I understand that’s not a very popular thing to say; one of the only things conservatives and liberals seem to agree on is that the poor and starving of third-world countries need some kind of help. Certainly many, many people would be very distressed to learn that their conscience-consoling donations to the third-world country of their choice were actually doing more harm than good, but that is just what is happening.

On the surface, foreign aid is a wonderful thing, the ultimate good work of society, and indeed on a personal level people helping people is extremely noble and provides precious hope for humanity. However, when dealing with nations and governments, goodwill and charity don’t always go over so well.

For example, American farmers have in the last century had serious difficulty staying in business in light of America’s remarkably low and heavily fluctuating produce prices, prompting the federal government to subsidize farmers’ sales and...