I’m not convinced this is the case. Do you have some comparisons of international spending on different public goods, or lobbying for such spending?
I don’t think such a comparison would make sense, since different public goods have different room for funding. For example the World Bank has a bigger budget than the WHO, but development/anti-poverty has a lot more room for funding (or less diminishing returns) than preventing global pandemics.
My sense that there’s little effort at coordination for global poverty comes from this kind of comparison:
Total U.S. official development assistance, known as ODA, rose to $26.8 billion in 2008 from $21.78 billion in 2007 and $23.5 billion in 2006.
US donation to the World Bank (which is apparently determined by negotiation among the members) in 2007: $3.7 billion (this covers 2 years I believe).
Lanrian mentioned an effort to coordinate foreign aid (ODA) but the effort seems very weak compared to other public good coordination efforts, because there is no enforcement mechanism (not even public shaming, as when was the last time you heard anything about this?). According to this document:
But no other DAC country has met the target since it was established, and the weighted
average of DAC members’ ODA has never exceeded 0.4% of GNP.
I guess “public goods” is part of what’s happening, given that some non-zero level of coordination exists, but it seems like a relatively small part and I’m not sure that it explains what you want it to explain, or even what it is that you want to explain (since you didn’t answer the question I asked previously about this).
ETA: I added a statement to my top level comment to correct “I don’t think I’ve ever heard of any efforts to coordinate internationally on foreign aid.”
I don’t think such a comparison would make sense, since different public goods have different room for funding. For example the World Bank has a bigger budget than the WHO, but development/anti-poverty has a lot more room for funding (or less diminishing returns) than preventing global pandemics.
Do you have some example of a public good that you are using to calibrate your expectations about international spending on typical public goods?
I don’t think it’s enough to say: people do a tiny amount of X but they don’t coordinate explicitly. You should also provide some evidence about the overall ability to coordinate.
(That said, I also agree that most of what’s going on, for explaining the difference between real aid budgets and what a utilitarian would spend, is that people don’t care very much.)
I don’t think such a comparison would make sense, since different public goods have different room for funding. For example the World Bank has a bigger budget than the WHO, but development/anti-poverty has a lot more room for funding (or less diminishing returns) than preventing global pandemics.
My sense that there’s little effort at coordination for global poverty comes from this kind of comparison:
US unilateral foreign aid (not counting private charitable donations):
US donation to the World Bank (which is apparently determined by negotiation among the members) in 2007: $3.7 billion (this covers 2 years I believe).
Lanrian mentioned an effort to coordinate foreign aid (ODA) but the effort seems very weak compared to other public good coordination efforts, because there is no enforcement mechanism (not even public shaming, as when was the last time you heard anything about this?). According to this document:
I guess “public goods” is part of what’s happening, given that some non-zero level of coordination exists, but it seems like a relatively small part and I’m not sure that it explains what you want it to explain, or even what it is that you want to explain (since you didn’t answer the question I asked previously about this).
ETA: I added a statement to my top level comment to correct “I don’t think I’ve ever heard of any efforts to coordinate internationally on foreign aid.”
Do you have some example of a public good that you are using to calibrate your expectations about international spending on typical public goods?
I don’t think it’s enough to say: people do a tiny amount of X but they don’t coordinate explicitly. You should also provide some evidence about the overall ability to coordinate.
(That said, I also agree that most of what’s going on, for explaining the difference between real aid budgets and what a utilitarian would spend, is that people don’t care very much.)