The G8 is meeting in Northern Ireland’s Belfast. The group of important industrial states is chaired this year by British Prime Minister David Cameron. London’s three top objectives are trade, taxation, and transparency.
No doubt, there will be a flurry of ponderous public statements and breathless press analyses. But as I argue on National Interest online, the meeting likely will be a waste.
Trade liberalization is a worthy goal, but the U.S. and European commitment to agricultural subsidies has essentially killed the Doha round under the World Trade Organization. America wants to negotiate the Trans-Pacific Partnership, but including Japan, which wants to protect its farmers, while excluding China, which is the largest economy in Asia, makes the process more than a little complicated. As for a U.S.-European Union agreement, France is standing in the way and other member states are likely to resist liberalization in one area or another.
Only on taxes is more progress likely—unfortunately. As Dan Mitchell long has pointed out, attacks on “tax havens” and such are primarily attempts to mulct more money out of the productive to subsidize the influential. (Influential and greedy. Indeed, higher taxes are used to satisfy perhaps the basest of human emotions, envy.)
Transparency is a better objective, but the greatest offenders are non-G8 members, especially in the Third World. As I point out:
The most important single step in this direction the G8 could take would be to discourage rather than encourage government-to-government transfers, or misnamed “foreign aid.” (G8 gatherings usually include boilerplate promises to up official development assistance.) The wealthy nations should cut the financial windpipe of the most corrupt and wasteful regimes. Private humanitarian and development assistance from NGOs to private people, and private investment and trade to private companies, are far more likely to deliver positive economic and social results with more limited opportunities for graft and abuse.
Finally, the G8 involves a curious anomaly for the U.S. While Washington pursues greater economic integration in the name of encouraging prosperity and growth, the U.S. could achieve the same result by reducing subsidies to the same countries. The Cold War has been over for 24 years. World War II ended 68 years ago. It really is time for Washington to stop defending Europe and Japan, as well as a number of other, non-G8 defense dependents, such as South Korea.
The Obama administration could make this G8 meeting more useful than normal by adding real substance to the agenda.