Time for Iraq to start paying for its own reconstruction

Iraq has benefited handsomely from this year’s surge in oil prices and is well-positioned financially to shoulder a greater share of its own economic and security needs, the U.S. government’s accounting watchdog concluded in a report released Tuesday.

Well let’s take a look at what kind of money they are pulling in:

Iraq racked up $32.9 billion in oil earnings from January through June. The GAO estimates that Iraq will earn $67 billion to $79 billion in oil sales this year! And they say that Iraq is still struggling to approach pre-invasion oil-production levels! You call that struggling?

Record high oil prices mean that Iraq’s government could post a budget surplus of more than $50 billion by year’s end. From 2005 to 2007, oil exports provided 94 percent of the Iraqi government’s revenues. The Iraqi government has run budget surpluses since 2005 that amounted to a cumulative $29.4 billion at the end of last year. Iraq could post a budget surplus for this year of $38.2 billion to $50.3 billion if oil prices remain high.

But they aren’t using any of that money on it’s citizens needs. The Oil Ministry spending fell by an annual rate of 92 percent, Electricity Ministry spending by 93 percent and Water Ministry spending by 13 percent. And these items have all affected the quality of life for it’s citizens who are finding hard to support the newly elected government.

The U.S. Congress has appropriated roughly $48 billion since 2003 for efforts to stabilize and reconstruct the nation. As of this June, the GAO said, about $42 billion of that money had been spent.

Time to to start paying up Iraq. You’re starting to turn into the millions of Americans in the U.S. who have become dependent on it’s government. The taxpayers of the U.S. can’t pay for citizens in two countries that don’t want to take responsibility for their lives.

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