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IRAQ DIVIDEND PEACE PLAN by Governor Jay Hammond 1922-2005 Iraq Oil Revenue invested, returning an anual equal spinoff dividend to every adult and child in Iraq.
Former Alaska Gov. Jay Hammond produced the video, "The Iraq Plan," about an Alaska-style dividend for Iraq. Jay said, "Had we not created a permanent fund here in Alaska ... no doubt those dollars would have all been spent in the traditional manner that has gotten those states and nations into trouble."
"To date we have a program which each year sends a check to each and every Alaskan ... that gives them a sense of ownership. It also inclines them to promote healthy development and to ensure that the maximum benefit from that natural resource development is equitably distributed.
"In many instances, states and nations that have had enormous amounts of oil wealth flow through their country have found themselves worse off. The reason being that a few people at the top of the heap reap the harvest and the little guy ... sees virtually nothing. Also, there's an inclination on the part of politicians ... to spend every dollar they can get their fingers on. The dividend program has created ... a militant ring of defense that surrounds the Permanent Fund. Whenever the politicians wish to invade it, the shareholders rise up in outrage, in protest."
The struggle in Iraq is "... evidence of the frustration and difficulty in coming up with any method and means to effectively offset the terrorism that is going on in that country today."
Hammond said "... there is another approach that I would much prefer ... that in Iraq, they adopt a program similar to what we have done in Alaska. Use their oil wealth to invest in spin-off dividends that would impact each and every Iraqi."
With an Iraq dividend, "there appeared to be the potential of establishing in Iraq, a democratic, capitalistic mindset on the part of the people. If they perceived it as our pipeline ... and that every time they interrupted oil flow, it was money out of their individual pockets, there would be a resistance to the type of thing that is occurring over there today." www.iraqdividend.com
Public resources should belong directly to the public....through mechanisms such as Alaska's permanent fund .. It is a model governments all over the world would be well-advised to copy. Jay Hammond
What better way to induce a capitalistic, democratic mind-set among Iraqis? Hammond said.
Far better than a few privileged kleptocrats living in opulent splendor while others grovel in squalor.
Without a Permanent Fund dividend program, Hammond said, Alaska will face the same fate as Nigeria. The World Bank estimates that $296 billion flowed in and out of that government's treasury during its oil boom, leaving them worse off than they were before, Hammond said.
The Economist magazine appropriately called such mismanaged oil wealth -the devil's excrement-, Hammond said. The pattern has been repeated around the globe where countries have come into an oil windfall, he said.
Absent something like our dividend program and ensuing public interest, those windfalls simply inflated a grab bag for special interests, he said.
Once deflated, the average citizen was left holding that empty bag, Hammond said.
Iraq is but the latest example.
Interests
Jay Hammond, the great champion of the Alaska Permanent Fund and self-described Bush Rat governor, died on August 2, 2005 My friend and colleague Peter Barnes offers the following thoughts:
One of my political heroes, Jay Hammond, died at the age of 83. Hammond is little known in the "Lower 48", but he ought to be. As governor of Alaska in the 1970s, when oil was developed on the North Slope, Hammond made sure the people of Alaska — every single one of them, now and forever — benefit directly from nature's largesse. He made Alaska a true ownership society.
Hammond's singular legacy is the Alaska Permanent Fund, an oil-capitalized mutual fund co-owned by every woman, man and child in Alaska — one person, one share. Out of its earnings, the Fund pays equal dividends to its co-owners. For the last quarter century, dividends have ranged between $1,000 and $2,000 per year, depending on the ups and downs of the stock market.
To appreciate Hammond's legacy, think of all the other places where oil has been found — from Saudi Arabia and Iraq to Nigeria and Texas. Nowhere else has this gift of nature been so equitably shared. Hammond took seriously language in the Alaska constitution which declares that the natural resources of the state belong to the people. Not oil companies, not the government, but quite literally the people. What a simple, yet radical, notion!
Hammond was no socialist. Far from it, he was a Republican who believed in small government. But he also believed in the commons — and every citizen's right to own a piece of it.
Late in his life, Hammond grew interested in extending the Permanent Fund model to other gifts of nature. He supported a nationwide Sky Trust, which would use revenue from auctioning carbon emission permits to pay equal dividends to all Americans. Such a plan would not only curb global warming; it would give every American, like every Alaskan, a bit of property income. It would make America an ecological ownership society, without raising taxes or enlarging government.
Perhaps Hammond was able to think outside the box because he wasn't a professional politician. He was a hunter, a bush pilot and a common sense citizen. He never aspired to be governor; some friends urged him to run, and unexpectedly, he won. After two terms in office, he retired to a log cabin in the mountains, accessible only by sea-plane. He was married to a native Alaskan woman for 53 years.
Is it necessary to add that we could use more Jay Hammonds today?
IraqDividend.com
