Living Car Free - The Story of Stuff

Any thoughts? Does 50% of our tax dollars really go to military spending? Can anyone fact check some of this stuff?

http://www.storyofstuff.com/

Hey... finding information about this topic, you'd think would lead to some differing opinions, but it does seem to be roughly correct. I'm also surprised that transportation (which we talk about a lot here) and education are really just drops in the bucket. :(



http://donklephant.com/2008/04/09/where-do-your-tax-dollars-go/ (http://donklephant.com/2008/04/09/where-do-your-tax-dollars-go/)

The median income family in Missouri paid $1,689 in federal income taxes in 2007. Here is how that money was spent:

1. Military: $713
2. Health: $373
3. Interest on Non-military Debt: $173
4. Anti-Poverty Programs: $146
5. Education, Training & Social Services: $74
6. Government & Law Enforcement: $66
7. Housing & Community Development: $56
8. Environment, Energy & Science: $45
9. Transportation, Commerce & Agriculture: $26
10. International Affairs: $17

or more pictorally:
http://www.warresisters.org/pages/images/pieFY09.gif
from http://www.warresisters.org/pages/piechart.htm (http://www.warresisters.org/pages/piechart.htm)

Well, we spend $800 billion annually on the military industrial complex, and have done so for decades. As long as it remains the primary component of our national budget, we'll always lag behind in health, education, and other things we actually need.

Any thoughts? Does 50% of our tax dollars really go to military spending? Can anyone fact check some of this stuff?

http://www.storyofstuff.com/

That's a cool video. I went to talk to the fine folks at Free Range Studios when I was in DC for the National Bike Summit.

Yes, its approximately correct. It's hard to be sure because of hidden items in the budget and that many of the costs are assigned to other areas, but actually benefit the military.

The military long ago realized that the best way to secure funding in congress was to make sure that defense spending was spread to every congressional district, so no one would dare vote against a military spending bill because that would take jobs away from their constituents.

I see that today The Secretary of Defense announced big cuts in the military budgets for the upcoming years. So much of the military spending is waste and fraud. I like the way the graph separates spending for our two current wars, showing the enormity of the expenses for these military boondoggles.

However, the military isn't really the biggest part of the budget. It's confusing on the graph, but I think that the 18 % portion labelled "Past Military" refers to a part of the national debt. The only way to decrease this is to pay down the debt, and it's unlikely that this will happen in the next 100 years--if ever.

I took this sociology class at a community college where the prof. lectured about the total cost of war, not just what we or governments spend but also the value of what we destroy. I don't remember if the figures he showed included an estimate on the value of people or just capital. Any accounting like that is approximate of course but still with all the talk about "bang for the buck" we forget that the things we "bang" have value. When we spend money for armaments we expect it to do more than that amount of damage. There must be some force multiplier we can apply to the each nation's military budget to roughly gauge the value of what that nation will destroy. The multiplier must be greater than 1 unless the nation is being irrational. Then the tricky part is to add the values of the shattered lives..... 1 Afghan civilian is worth what fraction of a NATO soldier? There must be a way to plug the data into a linear regression to get the value ratios among the different ruined lives.

I've read that we spend more on the military in this country than the next 32 countries do for military combined! Military spending contributed substantially to the fall of the Soviet Union.

It's confusing on the graph, but I think that the 18 % portion labelled "Past Military" refers to a part of the national debt.

Besides the portion of the current budget devoted to paying for past military expenses... (i.e. current payments toward principal or interest)

"Past Military" also includes pensions (and government payments for medical care/insurance) for former members of the military.

Ya, it's a very cool video with a ton of statistics. I did some fact-checking about a year ago when I first saw it and found out that it's pretty spot-on with the arguments they make and info they provide. I was so impressed that I really changed my rates of consumption drastically. ....good, good video.

That's a cool video. I went to talk to the fine folks at Free Range Studios when I was in DC for the National Bike Summit.

Yes, its approximately correct. It's hard to be sure because of hidden items in the budget and that many of the costs are assigned to other areas, but actually benefit the military.

The military long ago realized that the best way to secure funding in congress was to make sure that defense spending was spread to every congressional district, so no one would dare vote against a military spending bill because that would take jobs away from their constituents.

Maybe instead of arguing against military spending, we should just accept it as something that won't go away, but broaden the scope of military actions to include things that don't involve killing Muslims. For example, we could use military resources to rebuild levies around New Orleans, fix aged bridges, re-pave old bicycle paths, build parks, eradicate invasive plants, and maybe even interdict the wanna-be gangsters who keep tagging my neighborhood.

I've read that we spend more on the military in this country than the next 32 countries do for military combined! Military spending contributed substantially to the fall of the Soviet Union.

That confirms my suspicion that Canada's military spending isn't all that high. I don't have the stats in front of me, but I'm guessing that things like health care and education are higher ... I could be wrong though.

Ah, here we go ...

http://www.fin.gc.ca/taxdollar/text/html/pamphlet_-eng.asp

This is 2004/2005 information, but I doubt things have changed dramatically since then ... perhaps lower interest payments.

http://www.fin.gc.ca/taxdollar/text/html/pamphlet_1e.gif

Here's the 2007-2008 info:
http://www.fin.gc.ca/taxdollar/09/mm-eng.asp

Interest payments are indeed lower ... down from $0.17 on every dollar to $0.14 on every dollar.

After interest payments, elderly benefits are the next highest expenditure, followed by infrastructure type of things.

Maybe instead of arguing against military spending, we should just accept it as something that won't go away, but broaden the scope of military actions to include things that don't involve killing Muslims. For example, we could use military resources to rebuild levies around New Orleans, fix aged bridges, re-pave old bicycle paths, build parks, eradicate invasive plants, and maybe even interdict the wanna-be gangsters who keep tagging my neighborhood.

Works for me! In fact I have suggested before that we have a mandatory 2 year enlistment for EVERYBODY at the age of 18. Teach the ones that need it some discipline and a basic skill, if they like the military life let them continue. The military helps build roads and bridges in other countries why not here. However I have noticed they contract out many, many things they used to do themselves...like provide security for their own bases:twitchy: At the very large base just below my house the gates and access points are controlled by rent a cops...:rolleyes:

Aaron:)

Works for me! In fact I have suggested before that we have a mandatory 2 year enlistment for EVERYBODY at the age of 18. Teach the ones that need it some discipline and a basic skill, if they like the military life let them continue. The military helps build roads and bridges in other countries why not here. However I have noticed they contract out many, many things they used to do themselves...like provide security for their own bases:twitchy: At the very large base just below my house the gates and access points are controlled by rent a cops...:rolleyes:

Aaron:)

Doesn't work for me at all. The military by nature is a tool to enforce political will by violence. That's what it was created for.

Using mercenaries is just a way to hide stuff from the taxpayers, provide kickbacks for contributors and generally be unaccountable. They get the personnel because they pay higher. If we are going to do that, we might as well just pay the soldiers better.

If we want road building and bridges, why not just pay for them and get them. Lets not play little games with our money. If you insist on universal conscription, there are a lot of areas to use the personnel besides military uses.

Works for me! In fact I have suggested before that we have a mandatory 2 year enlistment for EVERYBODY at the age of 18. Teach the ones that need it some discipline and a basic skill, if they like the military life let them continue. The military helps build roads and bridges in other countries why not here. However I have noticed they contract out many, many things they used to do themselves...like provide security for their own bases:twitchy: At the very large base just below my house the gates and access points are controlled by rent a cops...:rolleyes:

Aaron:)

I think this would cause a rebellion of young people. And if they were building roads and bridges, it would take jobs from construction workers...like you, or like the people you supervise.

I agree with artkansas post #13. But, the military does seem to be very bike friendly nowadays. When I was young in the 1960s a lot of soldiers had bikes they brought back from tours in Europe so you saw a lot of bikes on base. My dad was a car nut but even he biked to work on this Raleigh three speed with a nice tool kit hanging in a bag below the saddle.

I think this would cause a rebellion of young people. And if they were building roads and bridges, it would take jobs from construction workers...like you, or like the people you supervise.

Why waist 2 years of every single mans life by making him build roads? What if einstein had wasted 2 years doing that? Let professional construction workers build bridges and roads, not high-school kids. I wouldnt even trust one of their toothpick bridges from science class!

That confirms my suspicion that Canada's military spending isn't all that high. I don't have the stats in front of me, but I'm guessing that things like health care and education are higher ... I could be wrong though.

Ah, here we go ...

http://www.fin.gc.ca/taxdollar/text/html/pamphlet_-eng.asp

This is 2004/2005 information, but I doubt things have changed dramatically since then ... perhaps lower interest payments.

http://www.fin.gc.ca/taxdollar/text/html/pamphlet_1e.gif

Here's the 2007-2008 info:
http://www.fin.gc.ca/taxdollar/09/mm-eng.asp

Interest payments are indeed lower ... down from $0.17 on every dollar to $0.14 on every dollar.

After interest payments, elderly benefits are the next highest expenditure, followed by infrastructure type of things.


I even see a small sliver in there called "Budgetary surplus". What the hell is that? That would never fly here.

Maybe instead of arguing against military spending, we should just accept it as something that won't go away, but broaden the scope of military actions to include things that don't involve killing Muslims. For example, we could use military resources to rebuild levies around New Orleans, fix aged bridges, re-pave old bicycle paths, build parks, eradicate invasive plants, and maybe even interdict the wanna-be gangsters who keep tagging my neighborhood.

Or -- since today is the 15th anniversary of the Rwandan genocide --, perhaps our tax dollars could help prevent similar disasters.

Not only do half your tax dollars go to military spending, Americans spend more money on death and killing machines than the rest of the world combined.