40 cents of each tax dollar

[Michael Tee]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/daniel-mcleod-and-barb-chalfonte/never-waste-a-crisis-re-e_b_187180.html

40 cents of each  tax dollar paid by the American taxpayer goes to the military.

Unbelievable really when you consider the bitching that goes on over health-care expenses and other socially necessary expenditures.

[Xavier_Onassis]

That 40¢ goes partly to pay for Veterans' healthcare, so there is some overlapping with the health care budget. It costs a vast amount to design and supply computer-enhanced prosthetics for bomb victims. I am not saying that they should not supply them, just that it is enormously expensive. Wars are cheaper when the really seriously injured simply died right there on the battlefield or within a week in some horrid field hospital.

[Michael Tee]

The easy way to adjust for veterans' health care is to figure out what they'd cost the nation if they were productively employed subject to an allowance for the general unemployment rate in their age-and-education demographic and not subject to the hazards of "armed combat" and then write off any increased expenses caused by their exposure to "combat."   Any way you slice it, the military is the primary beneficiary of ever tax dollar raised - - a near-total waste of valuable resources.

[BT]

According to wiki and the OMB the huffpo figures are off:

[Xavier_Onassis]

We rarely hear "this weapon is grotesquely overpriced" or "how much could we save if we just combined the Blue Angels and the Thunderbirds, or abolished both of these" It's not like there is not a huge amount of fat in the military budget.

[BT]

We rarely hear "this weapon is grotesquely overpriced" or "how much could we save if we just combined the Blue Angels and the Thunderbirds, or abolished both of these" It's not like there is not a huge amount of fat in the military budget.

Absolutely, all public expenditures should be examined for duplication and higher than reasonable costs.

Then again a lot of that cost is due to the governments own regulations, like paying union wages for work that could be done for half the cost.

[kimba1]

did we cover the topic of the air force and the navy?
awhile back it was brought up that the air force is redundant since the navy has jets also.

[Michael Tee]

The median income family in the United States
paid $4,451 in federal income taxes for 2008.
Here is how that money was spent:
Following the links from the original article I posted leads to a breakdown of where the average family's taxes went:

Military $1,309
Health $948
Non-military Interest on Debt $530
Military Interest on Debt $352
Income Security & Labor $320
Housing & Community $169
VeteransÓ Benefits $169
Food $160
Government $138
Education $134
Environment, Energy & Science $125
International Affairs $53
Transportation $45

The chart indicated that military expenditures were about 29.4% of the 2008 federal budget, but also that "interest" which was almost 20% of the 2008 fed budget could be divided into interest on military debt (about 8%) and interest on non-military debt (about 12%) - - so that in the 2008 budget, simply by adding interest on military debt to the direct military expenditure of 29.4%, you are getting to about 37%.  Veterans' benefits were counted separately in the 2008 figures as 3.8%, which would bring military spending to about 40% of total as originally stated in my first post to this thread.  If not counted separately in BT's figures, they are probably hidden in some of the other slices of his multicoloured pie chart.

I don't think the 40% is overstated at all.  Rather, I am somewhat concerned that the real costs of the war and the militarization of American society are under-counted through various forms of accounting trickery and federal deceit.

Isn't it interesting how NONE of the Tea Party "budget hawks" are at all interested in staunching the biggest leak in the Treasury, the military spending leak?   THAT is sacred not only to the hawks but to the "doves" as well - - a curious unanimity among all the "elected" legislators of the "two-party" system, eh?

[Plane]

Operateing the military is one of the origional purposes of the government , why isn't the military the biggest part of the government?

[sirs]

Especially when you consider that that is the chief function of Government, the protection (read NOT the care of) its citizenry

[Michael Tee]

<<Operateing the military is one of the origional purposes of the government , why isn't the military the biggest part of the government?>>

Your "original government" probably had the military role in its proper perspective.  George Washington warned against foreign entanglements and as far as I am aware, there was no standing federal army; but since the end of WWII, the U.S. military has been fighting wars all over the globe, always against pipsqueak "adversaries" and for obscure purposes having absolutely nothing to do with self-defence.

[sirs]

Never claimed to support every military intervention.  Merely acknowleding Plane's accurate reference, that the chief function of this government is the protection of its citizenry, of enemies both foreign & domestic.  Even agreeing with your likely distorted use of the 40% of the budget (since a chunk of that actually goes to veterens' healthcare), why wouldn't the chief function of the Government get the largest chunk??

[Xavier_Onassis]

The US is ideally situated for defense, with two wide oceans to either side and friendly nations North and South. Only Australia is better situated: all its borders are liquid.

We get into many more conflicts than we need to. Consider Switzerland or Sweden, with a much greater number of potentially hostile neighbors and fewer natural resources than the US. Neither has fought a war since the 1700's. If the US had stayed completely out of Iranian politics and Afghan politics and had been entirely neutral with regard to Palisrael, how would this have changed the past 50 years?

[sirs]

I noticed how Plane's point still hasn't been addressed.  Reminds me of those who keep wanting to criticize the AZ law, while never bothering to read it

[Plane]

The US is ideally situated for defense, with two wide oceans to either side and friendly nations North and South. Only Australia is better situated: all its borders are liquid.

We get into many more conflicts than we need to. Consider Switzerland or Sweden, with a much greater number of potentially hostile neighbors and fewer natural resources than the US. Neither has fought a war since the 1700's. If the US had stayed completely out of Iranian politics and Afghan politics and had been entirely neutral with regard to Palisrael, how would this have changed the past 50 years?

This idea is so out of date.

Staying out of WWI didn't work and staying out of WWII didn't work , that was back when you couldn't fly more than a few persons across the "pond"

It takes less time to cross the Atlantic or the Arctic with an attack now than it took to cross the Rine in the time of Fedrick the great.

If the US had not been an instigator and assistor in the struggle against Communism would the resistance to Communism acheiveing its worldwide goals have been adequite?

Many mistakes were made , but enough was done right that the mistakes of the other side made more diffrence. Communism is firmly planted in the dustbin of history.

Wouldn't you know there is another international conspiracy springing up as if to replace it ?








Wing in ground effect aircraft developed by the USSR .

A fleet of these heavylifters would have been able to carry an invasion force across the arctic and deep into the Alaskan and Canadian tundra.

Not much elese purpose for them , good thing they remained experimental eh?