President Trump announced recently that he plans to cut off aid to Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador. This will be 450 million in aid that these countries will no longer be receiving from the US. Trump’s reasoning behind this act was that these countries are not doing anything to stop the immigration flood into the United States. His reasoning is also backed by the theory that the best way to halt migration is to go to the root causes; however, many say that cutting off aid will actually make the issue worse. What should be happening in these countries are efforts to reduce violence, corruption, and help economic development. These positive changes will help stop immigration into the US and result in people wanting to stay in their home countries. But with these aid cuts, many US-backed programs that help fight against gangs and violence will be halted. Although legislation has a chance to fight this policy, there is a high chance that their aid will be cut completely for now and be reduced in the future.
Personally, I don’t believe completely cutting aid is the right response to this situation. I think we do need to do our research and be sure that our aid is not funding a corrupt government, but to cut aid completely seems like an overreaction. It makes sense that helping to support more economic development and peace within these countries would lead to fewer people trying to leave and I think that is something we should strive for when looking to help these countries and reduce immigration. It will be interesting to see what the actual result of this policy is.
Link: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/30/world/americas/trump-turns-us-policy-in-central-america-on-its-head.html
3 comments:
Caroline, very interesting article. Having visited a couple foreign countries it is very apparent when the governments role in the economy is not successful. Some countries like the US do it very well (some may say) and other countries struggle. A couple things I find ironic here, I agree that if our funds go toward building a better economy, then people would be less likely to leave. I also think that $450 million to 3 different countries to help build the economy is a drop in the bucket. It cannot go so far as to rebuild an economy. Also, cutting 450 million is just a drop in the bucket as well in terms of what the US spends on certain items. Overall, I hate to say that this move does not surprise me but I think helping these countries would be a better way to stop the immigration issue.
I agree that cutting aid to Central America for failing to control migration is not the best choice to make. This could bring further negative sentiments between Central America and the USA. This action could also drive up the migration numbers even more. Even though the aid is distributed inefficiently, it has helped some violence-prevention programs and a decrease in homicide rates. I think it would be more beneficial to work toward a less corrupt government and bring structure and incentives for better reforms. Increasing resources to Central America will lead to decreasing migration which can create a safe place to raise their children.
With a combined GDP of 123.41 Billion US dollars 450 million is less than one percent. To me this seems like either pulling in order to change policy, which is unlikely as crime and high birth rates naturally lead to high immigration out of a country, similar to Italy in the late 1800's. It would seem to me that as these countries have been viewed as some of the more corrupt countries of the world that foreign aid is likely not going to help the average Honduran, Guatemalan, or El Salvadorian and as such pulling foreign aid most likely won't do much harm to the people their and at least work on decreasing a growing U.S. budget deficit.
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