Benefits of Foreign Aid in the lives of Women

Okay so my friend sent me this article about the benefits Foreign Aid can have on women. The article is long, but I seriously suggest reading the whole thing. It's worth your time.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/23/magazine/23Women-t.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1&emc=eta1#


If you're pressed for time here is a 5 minute summary in video form that you can just watch:
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2009/08/20/magazine/kristof-audioss/index.html#


If you only have a minute...then read the insert below about why MFIs focus on giving loans to women!

WHY DO MICROFINANCE organizations usually focus their assistance on women? And why does everyone benefit when women enter the work force and bring home regular pay checks? One reason involves the dirty little secret of global poverty: some of the most wretched suffering is caused not just by low incomes but also by unwise spending by the poor — especially by men. Surprisingly frequently, we’ve come across a mother mourning a child who has just died of malaria for want of a $5 mosquito bed net; the mother says that the family couldn’t afford a bed net and she means it, but then we find the father at a nearby bar. He goes three evenings a week to the bar, spending $5 each week.

Our interviews and perusal of the data available suggest that the poorest families in the world spend approximately 10 times as much (20 percent of their incomes on average) on a combination of alcohol, prostitution, candy, sugary drinks and lavish feasts as they do on educating their children (2 percent). If poor families spent only as much on educating their children as they do on beer and prostitutes, there would be a breakthrough in the prospects of poor countries. Girls, since they are the ones kept home from school now, would be the biggest beneficiaries. Moreover, one way to reallocate family expenditures in this way is to put more money in the hands of women. A series of studies has found that when women hold assets or gain incomes, family money is more likely to be spent on nutrition, medicine and housing, and consequently children are healthier.