More than 180 million children under age 14 are child laborers with little hope of gaining an education. There are 5,000 new HIV infections each day. 600,000 women die each year from complications of pregnancy and childbirth. At current rates the population of the developing world will double in 34 years. Tropical rainforests equal to four times the size of Switzerland are destroyed each year.
Failed states continue to breed civil war and anarchy.
The list goes on. One vital question now facing the United States is whether it wants to continue the great experiment it began with the Marshall Plan. The cutbacks resulted both from the Clinton administration's government-wide program of downsizing and from budgetary cuts by Congress. In real dollar terms, the agency's budget is today 30 percent lower than it was in 1982. As a percentage of the U.S. gross national product, the foreign assistance budget is at its lowest level since the Second World War.