The misallocation of public revenues for private use and the low government allocations for economic and social development have contributed directly to Haiti's extreme poverty. After 1986, national budgets included a significantly larger portion for development efforts, but they continued to allocate the largest share--17 percent in FY 1987-88--to the armed forces and internal security forces (see Military Spending and Foreign Assistance , ch. 10). About 57 percent of FY 1988 expenditures were for wages and salaries 26 percent, for goods and services 10 percent, for interest payments 4 percent, for extrabudgetary spending and 3 percent, for transfers and subsidies. Compared with previous budgets in the 1980s, this budget included increased spending on wages and interest payments and decreased spending on goods and services, as well as an allocation for unspecified expenses. The FY 1989 budget continued these fiscal trends. The leading expenditure items in the FY 1989 budget were defense (16.4 percent), debt payments (15.8 percent), education (14.5 percent), health and social services (13.7 percent), and finance, public service, and commerce (12.4 percent). According to some reports, however, discrepancies existed between budget allocations and actual disbursements.

Data as of December 1989