UN Wasting US Tax Dollars Again

[dancingalone]

Nothing new.

http://www.foxnews.com/world/2010/0...aff/?loomia_ow=t0:s0:a4:g4:r4:c0.000000:b0:z5


The United Nations has quietly upped this year's peacekeeping budget for earthquake-shattered Haiti to $732.4 million, with two-thirds of that amount going for the salary, perks and upkeep of its own personnel, not residents of the devastated island.


The world organization plans to spend the money on an expanded force of some 12,675 soldiers and police, plus some 479 international staffers, 669 international contract personnel, and 1,300 local workers, just for the 12 months ending June 30, 2010.


Some $495.8 million goes for salaries, [COLOR=blue ! important][COLOR=blue ! important]benefits[/COLOR][/COLOR], hazard pay, mandatory R&R allowances and upkeep for the peacekeepers and their international staff support. Only about $33.9 million, or 4.6 percent, of that salary total is going to what the U.N. calls "national staff" attached to the peacekeeping effort.


Click here to see the supplementary budget document.
http://www.foxnews.com/projects/pdf/042010_budgetdocument.pdf
Presumably, the budget also includes at least part of some $10 million that the U.N. has spent on renting two passenger vessels, the Sea Voyager (known to some U.N. staffers as the "Love Boat") and the Ola Esmeralda, for a minimum of 90 days each, as highly subsidized housing for some of its peacekeepers and humanitarian staff. The tab for the two vessels, which offer catered food, linen service and comfortable staterooms and lounges, is about $112,500 per day.

Under a cost-sharing formula, the U.S. pays a 27 percent share of the entire $732.4 million peacekeeping tab for Haiti during this 12 month period, or about $197.7 million.
The ultimate size of the peacekeeping bill for Haiti this year has been a source of much concern among the three dozen or so of the U.N.'s 192 members who pick up roughly 96 percent of the U.N.'s overall peacekeeping bill.

 

[CoryKS]

The UN is a waste of tax dollars.

 

[dancingalone]

The UN is a waste of tax dollars.

At one point it was a useful forum for American concerns and issues. No more. Time to scale back US funding for UN missions and efforts. They only add yet another corrupt layer of bureaucrats with their hands out for US largesse. We should actively work to deemphasize the UN. (Some would argue this already is true.)

 

[Sukerkin]

From what I recall, chaps, America pretty much reneges on most of it's renumerative responsibility to the UN. I could be wrong or delusional but I have a firm memory of a big entry in the "owing" column from the States.

I could understand your position if that was not so, tho'.

Still, even then, I wouldn't kid yourself that your government ever does anything that was not in it's strategic interest - whether that's the same as in your interests is a different matter of course.

Now if you want to talk about the waste of my tax Pounds that is the EU, we might have a point of agreement :lol:.

 

[crushing]

Now if you want to talk about the waste of my tax Pounds that is the EU, we might have a point of agreement :lol:.

Next your tax pounds may go to help your neighbor holiday in the French Riviera.

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/was...ts-have-been-violated-at-least-in-europe.html

Only those that hate the poor and downtrodden that can't afford to exercise their right to vacation would be opposed to such a wonderful idea.

 

[dancingalone]

From what I recall, chaps, America pretty much reneges on most of it's renumerative responsibility to the UN. I could be wrong or delusional but I have a firm memory of a big entry in the "owing" column from the States.

At some point, we were in great arrears on the amount of money pledged. Clinton's administration remedied that to a big extent if I recall correctly. Dunno about the current balance, but surely you will concede that the US pays in a huge amount, greater than any other nation?

Still, even then, I wouldn't kid yourself that your government ever does anything that was not in it's strategic interest - whether that's the same as in your interests is a different matter of course.

We participate in a lot of missions, directly or indirectly (through funding) that have no real strategic purpose for the United States. Disaster relief in Indonesia for example. Sure you can find a tie somewhere in everything, but it would be misleading to say that the US always acts in self-interest. We do not - we're suckers for a sob story wherever it comes from.

Now if you want to talk about the waste of my tax Pounds that is the EU, we might have a point of agreement :lol:.

I might chuckle more about the EU's problems with funding Greece if I didn't know I as an American tax-payer will be helping myself through outlays to the IMF.

 

[Sukerkin]

I did a little bit of digging to back up my vague memory on this one. It seems that the US is not alone in being somewhat 'careless' when it comes to paying in to the UN, tho' it is the worst of the bunch:

http://www.globalpolicy.org/images/pdfs/US_vs_total_debt_graph_dec_09.pdf

 

[Sukerkin]

As to the share of funding, I was surprised to find this result on Wikipedia (I know, I know hardly authoratitive but good as a starting point if people want to dig further):

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations#Funding

 

[dancingalone]

I did a little bit of digging to back up my vague memory on this one. It seems that the US is not alone in being somewhat 'careless' when it comes to paying in to the UN, tho' it is the worst of the bunch:

http://www.globalpolicy.org/images/pdfs/US_vs_total_debt_graph_dec_09.pdf

I'm sure there's a game in there somewhere. You never want to be completely paid up since that removes some leverage you have.

 

[Sukerkin]

Next your tax pounds may go to help your neighbor holiday in the French Riviera.

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/was...ts-have-been-violated-at-least-in-europe.html

Only those that hate the poor and downtrodden that can't afford to exercise their right to vacation would be opposed to such a wonderful idea.

ROFLKLITA! To quote Victor Meldrew, I don't believe it! That one will bear a little investigation later on .

 

[CoryKS]

As to the share of funding, I was surprised to find this result on Wikipedia (I know, I know hardly authoratitive but good as a starting point if people want to dig further):

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations#Funding

Japan pays twice as much as the next highest contributor? WTF?

 

[dancingalone]

As to the share of funding, I was surprised to find this result on Wikipedia (I know, I know hardly authoratitive but good as a starting point if people want to dig further):

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations#Funding

I'd be curious to see those numbers expressed as a percentage of national GDP. My hunch is that the Japanese are being fairly generous while the French are niggardly, even if they like to be mouthy on the world stage.

 

[Sukerkin]

We participate in a lot of missions, directly or indirectly (through funding) that have no real strategic purpose for the United States. Disaster relief in Indonesia for example. Sure you can find a tie somewhere in everything, but it would be misleading to say that the US always acts in self-interest. We do not - we're suckers for a sob story wherever it comes from.

Aye, a valid point that. As you say, if you look hard enough you can generally dig up some link to a self-serving interest but it would be churlish to claim that every action has to have a realpolitik motivation :tup:.

 

[Sukerkin]

I'd be curious to see those numbers expressed as a percentage of national GDP. My hunch is that the Japanese are being fairly generous while the French are niggardly, even if they like to be mouthy on the world stage.

I haven't found anything directly on this yet (I'll have a deeper search in a minute). I did find this:

"5. The United States is afforded a discounted assessment rate by the United Nations.

The formula used by the United Nations to calculate membership dues is based on the principle of “capacity to pay”, and is principally determined using each country’s share of the global economy, with discounts provided for high national debt and low per capita income. According to the World Bank, the United States accounts for slightly more than 27 percent of global GDP, but is assessed only a 22 percent share of the UN regular budget and 26 percent of the UN peacekeeping budget, which includes a surcharge for permanent members of the Security Council. Meanwhile, other member states are assessed more than their share of the global economy in order to compensate for the reduction given to the United States."

But this is from what I assume to be a very pro-UN group {http://www.unausa.org/Page.aspx?pid=868} so it might be 'pinch of salt' time with their figures.

 

[Sukerkin]

Japan pays twice as much as the next highest contributor? WTF?

Aye, that was my reaction too .

 

[Sukerkin]

the French are niggardly, even if they like to be mouthy on the world stage.

QFT :lol: {I think my one main uncontrollable prejudice is showing there }

 

[crushing]

This is a twelve year old analysis (almost to the day), but has a lot of interesting and related information regarding the UN "debt": http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa-304.html

 

[Sukerkin]

Nice find, Crushing :tup:.

I am constantly amazed what a brilliant resource the Net can be in discourses like this. In just a few minutes we've had a browse around and found information that would have taken us weeks to uncover by 'conventional' means of research (if we ever did find them).

 

[Sukerkin]

Not having much luck trying to find a breakdown of UN funding as a percentage of the funding nations GDP.

I did find this analysis of per capita GDP tho, which is interesting in it's own right:

http://unstats.un.org/unsd/demographic/products/socind/inc-eco.htm