Foreign aid should be increased

Thank you for opening up this debate David12N. I will argue that foreign aid should not be increased, on the grounds that countries such as the US have enough internal problems with poverty as it is, and as such their governments have a duty to help their own citizens before they help others around the world. Firstly, just because countries like the USA are extremely wealthy does not mean that the wealth within that country comes to everyone in that country. I'm sure you have heard of the "1%" in the USA, referring to the fact that the richest 1% of Americans are richer than the other 99% combined. Now the Bible says "take the log out of your own eye before you take the speck out of your brother's eye": I'm not religious at all, but the point here is that MEDCs should take care of their own poverty and hunger before they go abroad to help others, because that is the duty of a government (to provide for the protection of the individual rights of its citizens). I do not believe the USA should be sending money abroad in the form of foreign aid when, according to 2012 census results, 46 million Americans (c.15% of the country) live in poverty (that is to say, below $11,670/annum for one person, and an extra $4,060/annum for every extra household resident). I do not believe a country such as the USA should be sending money abroad when, as of 2013, over 50% of public school children should be living in poverty. Meanwhile the US government sends abroad $37.68bn every year to help those in the third world, when 15% of their own citizens struggle to feed themselves and their families. A government's primary concern should be to look after its own people, and only once it has done that should it look abroad to help others. Secondly, a lot of countries which receive foreign aid do not see that money go towards feeding their people, and in fact there is evidence to suggest that the "[foreign] aid culture" in African countries has led these countries to see unprecedented rises in inflation, making the poor even poorer, and increasing the chance of civil conflict significantly. We can also see examples of aid being allegedly taken (obviously they'll never confess to it) by the governments of dictatorial regimes to fund their own personal war chests while the people for whom the aid was intended never see a penny of it. The ultimate truth is that despite the fact that wealthy countries have sent over $1tn to Africa alone over the past 60 years, African levels of poverty are higher in 2015 than they were in the 1970s. Over half the population of Africa (350m people to be exact) live on less than a dollar a day. Therefore, for one reason or another, we can see that foreign aid, although an incredibly well-intended and positive sentiment, does not have a positive effect on the third world - in fact, it has quite the opposite effect. Therefore, shouldn't the governments of the US, UK and other wealthy countries in the world spend more on helping their own citizens living in poverty and hunger, instead of throwing that money into a giant bonfire of corruption and good intentions. After all, T.S. Eliot once said "most of the evil in this world is done by people with good intentions".