(no subject)

[pmb]

Y'know, we could have just given every Iraqi citizen $37 336.58 and we'd still be ahead by 3,000 american lives and 500,000 iraqi lives. A trillion is a very large number. I bet that, for a flat rate of 37k per capita, we could have gotten the entire Iraqi army to overthrow Saddam all on their own.

Or, as an alternate view, you and I and everyone we know in this country has paid or will pay 4,000 dollars each for this useless war.

Comments

[patrissimo.livejournal.com]

Most of that money in one way or another is going back into our economy, whether it's going into supply manufacturing or salaries for the personel or whatever.

You seem to be mixing up "money" and "wealth". It is true that the little pieces of paper we give to people to fund the war do not disappear, they get handed to other people and so on in a long chain of transactions. The same would be true if we gave them to Iraqis, since (unless they change their currency), the only thing to do with dollars is to spend them on something in the US. So they come back to our economy regardless.

What does not come back is the time and energy which the little pieces of paper purchase. If we spend a $100B on the war, we are probably commanding roughly $100B worth of goods and services, and directing them towards a certain end. If we had not done this, those same goods and services could have been directed towards another purpose, one with more positive effect on people's happiness.

Manufacturing war supplies takes resources. Those resources would have done other things if not directed toward the war. Don't get confused by accounting gimmickry.

[freyley.livejournal.com]

In addition to the waste of people's time and effort, there's also the probable future waste of potential good, as we racked up enough of a debt that our interest payments are becoming even more noticeable. The longer we keep doing that, the more debt we have, the more we have to pay interest, the less money we could be spending on local programs.

(not to suggest we want to have no debt, just that at a certain point it starts to interfere, and we're getting there, if not already there)

[dragonmudd.livejournal.com]

You misunderstand me. I was trying to argue that spending that wealth on the war effort is more beneficial to our economy than giving the money away to the Iraqi people.

[patrissimo.livejournal.com]

That's what I thought you said - and I believe that it is wrong. If we give the money to Iraqi's, they will buy American goods with it (what else would they do with dollars?). The result is that the wealth is directed towards giving people American goods, rather than buying bombs and tanks and fueling planes and carriers or whatever it is we do with the money when fighting a war.

In the former case, at the end of the day, people have lots of stereos and Ford pickups and whatever. In the latter case, you've blown up a lot of shit and flown a lot of planes in circles, and maybe stockpiled a bunch more supplies for destroying things. It's no contest.

[dragonmudd.livejournal.com]

Oh, I see what you are saying now. Good point.