How Generous Are We to Haiti? Two Bucks a Person.

A ludicrous New York Times opinion, "How Generous Are We to Haiti? Two Bucks a Person" (January 15th, 2010) presents misleading statistics on the subject of aid to Haiti.

The United States contributes $2.32 per American to Haiti each year. That’s much less than other countries do, even though Haiti is in our hemisphere and has historic close ties to the U.S.

Of course, the author should have realized that averaging total donations over all Americans would have us counting homeless Joe down the street among those Americans who "should" be sending money to other now homeless folks in Haiti.

Homeless Joe isn't the only one not already contributing to Haitian aid. In fact, according to recent statistics available here more than 40% of Americans currently pay no federal income tax. Now it looks like tax-payers are contributing about $4 per person to Haiti. Of course, the wealthy are likely contributing thousands.