"The Three Trillion Dollar War"

Good question:

Keynesian trillions, Editorial, LA Times: President Bush['s]... final State of the Union speech made clear that he intends ... to ... spend whatever it takes to secure Iraq and Afghanistan -- and his legacy.

While the president's speechwriters were tweaking his address Monday, the White House announced that Bush would ask for $70 billion more for the two wars this year. A Pentagon spokesman said combat operations were costing $12 billion a month, with $9.2 billion spent in Iraq. That's just for combat operations. Including replacing equipment that's being used up and providing medical care and disability benefits for the wounded, Iraq has already cost well over $1 trillion. Back in early 2006, when war spending was running about $5 billion a month, economists Joseph Stiglitz and Linda Bilmes were sharply criticized for a study that predicted the Iraq war would cost up to $2 trillion. Their sequel, to be released next month, is titled "The Three Trillion Dollar War."

The interesting question is why the U.S. economy, beneficiary since 9/11 of the largest military spending binge in history, now requires $150 billion more in the form of a short-term stimulus package. Why hasn't the $1 trillion in defense spending, in addition to the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts, been sufficient to keep the economic boom going? ... Does that mean the fundamentals of our economy are weaker than we thought, and a deeper slump might have occurred without all that spending? ...

The economist John Maynard Keynes taught us in the 1930s that money spent on guns -- or butter, or even digging ditches and filling them up again -- had the same stimulative effects on a slumping economy. We've developed a more nuanced view of government spending since then, but it's still worth asking: What would Keynes say about a $3-trillion war?

Update: Paul Krugman:

An Iraq recession?, Paul Krugman Blog: One thing I get asked fairly often is whether the Iraq war is responsible for our economic difficulties. The answer (with slight qualifications) is no.

Just to be clear: I yield to nobody in my outrage over the way we were lied into a disastrous, unnecessary war. But economics isn’t a morality play, in which evil deeds are always punished and good deeds rewarded.

The fact is that war is, in general, expansionary for the economy, at least in the short run. World War II, remember, ended the Great Depression. The $10 billion or so we’re spending each month in Iraq mainly goes to US-produced goods and services, which means that the war is actually supporting demand. Yes, there would be infinitely better ways to spend the money. But at a time when a shortfall of demand is the problem, the Iraq war nonetheless acts as a sort of WPA, supporting employment directly and indirectly.

There is one caveat: high oil prices are a drag on the economy, and the war has some — but probably not too much — responsibility for pricey oil. Mainly high-priced oil is the result of rising demand from China and other emerging economies, colliding with sluggish supply as the world gradually runs out of the stuff. But Iraq would be exporting more oil now if we hadn’t invaded — a million barrels a day? — and that would have kept prices down somewhat.

Overall, though, the story of America’s economic difficulties is about the bursting housing bubble, not the war.

Comments

[hari]

The most amazing part of this equation is simply that Congress and its mandarins didn't do the proper due diligence of Bush's strategy of getting stuck in Iraq mud.
Politicians of all breed are the worst enemies of State in modern democratic states (we just saw it demontrated in Hesse/Germany's state elections last Sun).

Either our western politicians are becoming half-cooked neanderthals or they've been poorly educated/trained for managing affairs of the state. The failure of modern day politicians is getting worse. A sad reflection on those who elect them!

The question is really do we need them?

Or do we need the post office to run the state.... for us (remember who said that?).

[ral]

The "three trillion dollar war" is part of the Bush-Cheney doctrine of crowding out. By spending trillions of dollars on the military in abroad, they can crowd out social spending at home. This has never been a kind and gentler administration, nor was it ever meant to be one. The term "compassionate conservative" has proven to be an oxymoron.

[James Kroeger]

Yes, Mark, the editors of the LA Times are asking a very, very good question:

The interesting question is why the U.S. economy...now requires $150 billion more in the form of a short-term stimulus package. Why hasn't the $1 trillion in defense spending, in addition to the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts, been sufficient to keep the economic boom going? ... Does that mean the fundamentals of our economy are weaker than we thought, and a deeper slump might have occurred without all that spending?

The answer should be apparent to any Democrat Economist. The incredible borrowing spree of the past several years has really been the only thing that kept the economy from collapsing into a Greatest Depression Ever as a direct result of the massive tax cuts Bush et al. gave to the rich.

Reducing the income tax rates of rich people is always CONTRACTIONARY.

An income tax cut by itself cannot produce a net economic stimulus. This is because a tax cut by itself must necessarily be accompanied by a reduction in government spending. Governments cannot spend money that they do not have, so any time a government reduces the amount of taxes it collects, it is automatically depriving itself of the money it needs to continue spending as it had. Unless something else is done a tax cut automatically forces the government to reduce its spending. The 'something else' that usually enables governments to continue spending is called borrowing.

When governments borrow money, the economic result is always the same: strong, direct economic stimulus. This is because money that had been taken out of the economy (saved) is then spent by the government. In contrast, an income tax cut by itself takes money that would have been spent by the government and gives at least some of it to savers who will remove a portion of the money from the economy. The net result? (Decrease in G) > (Increase in C) = net decline in aggregate demand. That's contractionary folks, any way you look at it.

The only time an income tax cut by itself is not contractionary is when all those receiving a tax cut go out and spend all of it. When that happens, the (Decrease in G) = (Increase in C). Result: neither expansion nor contraction for there is no change in total spending. That's the best you can hope for if you cut taxes and pay for them with spending cuts. Listening John McCain?

This reality is the overarching sin of Republican economic fantasies. They've never been right about the 'presumed' stimulative effect of a tax cut, but that hasn't stopped them from endlessly promoting their favorite myths. What is more difficult to comprehend is why [what I call] Democrat economists not challenged them on this essential point? Nothing would provide a better answer to the editors of the LA Times.

Is there even the slimmest chance that Democrat economists will expose the Tax Cut Populism of the Republican Party? Maybe a very slim one. It would help if they would stop allowing Republican economists to refer to a Combo Fiscal Initiative [tax cuts + borrowing] as a single initiative [tax cuts]. The Republicans say, "We're going to cut your taxes." They don't say, "We're going to cut your taxes and then borrow the money we need to keep spending as we have been." Insist that the Republicans explain if they are proposing a (1) Tax Cut, or (2) a Tax Cut combined with a borrowing stimulus (to counter the contractionary effect of the Tax Cut) because the distinctions matter.

See how easy that would be?

[prostratedragon]

Krugman reminds us of the dog-whistle origin of the phrase "compassionate conservativsm."

[reason]

Look at the trade balance for your answer.

says...

James Kroeger, the country would have been well-served, if you had been able to go on national TV after Bush's State of the Union address. What you wrote was brilliant and concise.

[anne]

We were driven by lies and fear to invade and occupy a country of no possible threat to America, and we are each day preparing to continue the war and occupation for years to come beyond the ability of the coming President to leave Iraq. Hundreds of thousands of Iraqis have needlessly died, countless wounded, millions have become international and internal refugees, neighborhoods are rubbled and what is not rubble is walled.

Thousands of Americans are needlessly dead, tens of thousands physically and psychologically and morally wounded, our Constitution mocked our humanitarian idealistic heritage trashed, our resources squandered beyond imagination.

[Ben Stein the Hack]

Umm, isn't this obvious?

Think about how the $3 trillion is likely to be spent.

1) On direct expenditures to the Iraqi government (food, bribes, salaries, grants, etc.).

2) On health care and other recovery measures for injured soldiers.

3) I believe this $3 trillion also includes lost productivity from dead and injured soldiers (as well as their lost productivity while they are abroad in the deserts of Iraq).

4) To the extent that this $3 trillion is being spent on "guns", these are no longer M-16s for the most part, but instead highly sophisticated weapons systems that are outsourced to (European and US) defense contractors. The distribution of this guns money is being done consistently with Republican ideology. Instead of spending $10 billion on a manufacturing plant to build guns, we're giving Lockheed Martin $100 billion to "develop and build" guns, with maybe $10 billion being spent on actual Keynesian type spending and the rest being distributed to LM's executives and shareholders (I don't know what the typical breakdown actually is, but I understand that the typical defense contractor's receipts are very top- and investor-heavy).

5) Ditto with the extremely expensive use of contractors, where the U.S. government pays enormous amounts of to contracting firms, who then parcel out small amounts of money for the actual work (hiring military personnel, building a bridge or school), and then pocket the rest for their executives and shareholders.

In other words, if we're going to look at this spending on guns from the perspective of Keynesianism, I think you have to talk about the fact that this is not efficient demand stimulation. This war has now lasted longer than WWII, and many of the costs associated with it are sinkholes and not demand triggers. Killing and maiming young men are not effective economic policy.

And even to the extent that this war might be said to stimulate demand, you have to look at just how inefficient that stimulus is. The distribution of the economic benefits of this war has been structured much like the Bush tax cuts: almost all of the gains go to CEOs, big business, and investors, while only a small percentage of the enormous overall cost goes to directly stimulating demand.

A supply-side war if you will.

Other than that, I thoroughly agree with James Kroeger above.

[Ben Stein the Hack]

Also, the obvious point following on the above is that many of the contractors we give billion dollar contracts to actually subcontract with US employees or firms.

Blackwater is hiring mercenaries regardless of nationality, and Halliburton is typically hiring the local Iraqi firm to build the bridge or school.

[anne]

We are nearly 5 years in on a shameful war and occupation, while giving no thought to more than 1,400 American bombings in urban Iraq in the year of the surge, no thought to 40,000 pounds of bombs dropped from the sky in mere minutes on urban Iraq, no thought to a domino effect that has truly been evidenced and wrecked destruction from Somalia to Pakistan to Lebanon to Afghanistan to Gaza to Iraq, even as the domino effect in Vietnam would mean a destruction of Cambodia that is still beyond imagination.

[anne]

We began the shock and awe, this needless immoral war and occupation, being assured from the University of Chicago to the American Entyerprise Institute to the Federal Reserve to the Pentagon to the Whitehouse that was and occupation would be at least cheap if not costless and possibly even profitable what with oil and all. Then, no matter the obvious astonishing cost, the need was to deny there was a cost and belittle those would would tell us of the truse cost.

Linda Bilmes was ridiculed and threatened by a Defense Department officer who formally complained of her work on american casualties to her Dean, then changed the military's public recording of American casualties.

[Callahan]

Bad as 3 TRILLION is, it pales to the cost of illegal immigrants.

[save_the_rustbelt]

At least $2T is future spending:

rebuilding the Army (and to a smaller extent the Marines)

1/2 trillion

re-eqiuping the Guard and Reserve

1/2 trillion

Net present value of 60 years of VA health care services

$1 trillion

Just my own rough estimates.

[pgl]

Even if we needed fiscal stimulus in the past few years (see my first disagreement with a KNZN post ever over at Angrybear yesterday for why I doubt this premise), we could have spent $3 trillion on housing in poor areas or better roads and bridges, or better schools. But no, we decided to spend $3 trillion blowing up the countryside of Iraq so the Arabs will hate us for another generation. Stupid, stupid, stupid!

[robertdfeinman]

Obviously the follow on effect of digging a hole and filling it up again is not the same as building bridges or training more nurses and teachers.

Our preferred Keynesian "stimulation" seems to be building bombs and blowing them up. So the net result is not zero as with digging holes, but negative.

There are two issues here. The macro-economic one seems to be that some sorts of spending are better than others, filling holes notwithstanding.

The second issue is the moral one. Is it a "good thing" to enrich war profiteers? Is it a good thing to make owners and managers of military suppliers increasingly wealthy at the expense of others in society?

Some will also make an economic argument against increasing wealth inequality. We've discussed this many times. Favored sectors (and remember all militarism is funded by the government) alter priorities. The over-militarized society tends to become less efficient and less competitive. With the US facing more vigorous international competitors our lack of internal development puts us at a bigger disadvantage than it did when we were the only player left standing.

Present policy seems to lean towards international intimidation rather than international competition. Who knows, this may even work. A country threatened with first strike nuclear weapons (as was just suggested by a bunch of generals) may prefer to trade to its disadvantage rather than the alternative.

Is there any sign that the US public is willing to adapt to a more modest role of the US in the world and the corresponding decline in our standard of living? I haven't seen it. Every pol promotes "growth" and increased militarism.

As Pogo said: "We have met the enemy and he is us."

[anne]

STR makes a rough accountant's estimate that will likely prove all too precise, which is another reason the blithe proposal by Barack Obama to increase our military force by 100,000 has been distressing. We must build the military for defense, for insuring peace, not for the terrible waging of interminable supposedly inevitable but actually needless self-defeating war.

PGL is sensible, but for the word "countryside." We have repeatedly wrecked destruction in Iraqi towns and cities. I remember watching film of tanks filing along the streets of Fallujah firing to either side, thinking about the rubbling of a city of possibly 300,000.

[skeptonomist]

Here's part of a comment I made on a NYT editorial on the stimulus package a few days ago:

---------
To put the size of the proposed stimulus package in perspective, consider that since September 2001 (start of fiscal 2002), the yearly stimulus has been between $317 and $568 billion - for 2007 and 2008 the estimates are $421 and $451 respectively (these numbers are the on-budget deficits). These previous "packages" were mostly in the form of tax cuts, on income taxes for the upper brackets and also on capital-gains and dividends. Would $145 billion more of the same have a very large effect? Would any package of this size have a large effect?

Consider also that the period from 1992 to 2000 was the only comparable period since 1969 in which the stimulus was consistently reduced. This was a time of relatively high GDP growth, and unemployment was reduced from just under 8% to less than 4%, a greater reduction than any time since 1955.
-------------------

It occurs to me that the official on-budget numbers might not include Iraq war spending - if they don't then the recent and current stimulus is $100-200 billion greater annually. But anyway, this would be a partial answer to the LAT editorial - the war spending was a fraction of on-going stimulus.

[James Kroeger]

Obviously the follow on effect of digging a hole and filling it up again is not the same as building bridges or training more nurses and teachers.

A good example of an investment in human capital that would produce verifiable results: doubling or tripling the number of teachers and doubling or tripling the number of classrooms. There is one resource (input) that teachers need a lot more of in order to produce measurable improvements in the quality of our educational system, and that is TIME. Reducing classroom sizes to one half or one third their current average size would give teachers more of their most valuable tool, time.

If you teach in the suburbs and most of your students are 'low maintenance' because they've had a lot of help and modeling at home, then you don't need as much of the time resource as a teacher in an economically challenged neighborhood desparately needs. If we want improved educational outcomes, we need to invest more of this precious resource into those areas where more marginal students are in the classrooms. They don't need more computers and equipment; they need classroom sizes as small as 6-10 students.

Of course, whenever you want to improve the quality of the output of any enterprise, it is going to cost you more. That's an investment in human capital that would pay real dividends. (Compare to the solution offered by the Republicans: threaten teachers with their jobs if they don't produce the results you want. Don't give them any more of the resources they need; just be more demanding of them.)

[anne]

The question we need to ask precisely is why we have passed through the years from the initial budget of George Bush in 2002, with low longer term intertest rates, lowered taxes and an increasing deficit caused solely by increasing military spending while economic growth has been relatively weak?

When I note that increasing military spending has been solely responsible for the increasing deficit since 2002, I am only noting that while social spending has declined as a portion of national income, military spending has sharply increased.

Military spending in a way I do not precisely understand, has obviously lessened our ability to grow. I am quite willing to agree to the inherent destructiveness of much our military spending since 2002, and I abhor our spending on war and occupation, but the relative absence of stimulus effect puzzles me at least somewhat.

[James Kroeger]

The question we need to ask precisely is why we have passed through the years from the initial budget of George Bush in 2002, with low longer term intertest rates, lowered taxes and an increasing deficit caused solely by increasing military spending while economic growth has been relatively weak?

Yes, Anne, why have we? Remember this graph that Paul Krugman put on his website a while ago? As much as I hate Bush's evil war, the reason why the economy has struggled after his deficit spending and tax cuts and historically low interest rates has nothing to do with the fact that much of the spending was on military paychecks, etc.

The reason why, as I mentioned above, is because of the income tax rate cuts on the wealthy. They had a strongly contractionary impact on the economy that much of the increased deficit spending (much of it military) managed to offset. If the Bush tax cuts had not been enacted, and the same explosion of deficit spending had occurred, the economy would have truly exploded.

[reason]

James Kroeger...
Please look at the trade balance. I've told you this before - your simple Keynesianism doesn't work for open economies. The US Economy circa 1970 was effectively closed. But not any more.

[billyblog]

It was easy to agree with robertdfeinman on most of what he wrote. But I'm genuinely puzzled by logic which seems implicit in his last two paragraphs:

"Present policy seems to lean towards international intimidation rather than international competition. Who knows, this may even work. A country threatened with first strike nuclear weapons (as was just suggested by a bunch of generals) may prefer to trade to its disadvantage rather than the alternative.

"Is there any sign that the US public is willing to adapt to a more modest role of the US in the world and the corresponding decline in our standard of living?"

I find it difficult to believe that feinman is suggesting that abandonment of intimidation (aka brass knuckled imperialism) can be expected to lead, via a "more modest role of the US in the world," to a "corresponding decline in our standard of living."

While I won't hold my breath waiting for the total Kumbayization of American foreign policy, I would have thought that one of the lessons of the post-WWII period has been to highlight the limits of military power – even economically. Will our standard of living really go down if we divert a trillion or two (Where are you now that we need your wit and wisdom, Everett Dirksen?) spent on things military to, say, health care, a bit of infrastructure improvement, researching and developing clean energy alternatives, etc.?

But perhaps there was a subtlety which escaped me there.

[anne]

I would argue that the absence of what should have been more of a stimulus from low long term interest rates, and low taxes and increased government spending, had little to do with economic openness or international trade or immigration, and much to do with the self-destructive effect of the nature of our military spending. I am not entirely sure, for we have failed to study the effects of military spending as though such massive spending were of no consequence and especially no adverse consequence, but spending on war and occupation has harmed us economically.

Wrecking destruction a world away, must be harming us economically. We have been after war and occupation longer than the time in which we were in the World War. Dropping 40,000 pounds of bombs on a town in Iraq, has to be sapping us economically.

[Timetheos]

Some excellent posts here, including Kroeger and "the hack". I would like to elaborate though: there is a difference between spending on "expense" and "capital". Spending on something like a bomb is really temporary. The bomb, once used, is gone (much like an expense item). Spending on items such as infrastructure and education not only provide a short term effect similar to spending on making bombs, but also a long term effect (similar to capital and dividends).

Yes, I am not an economist, nor do I play one on TV, but I've been around long enough to know the difference between an investment and a splurge.

[anne]

Martin Luther King argued continually that Vietnam was fought at the expense of America's poor, and the dissipation of the War on Poverty in the wake of war tells me King was correct. We are fighting a war and occupying Iraq at the expense of America's middle class and poor. We must be, and the President is determined that war and occupation will go on indefinitely.

Needy children go without health care insurance, needy American Indians will be going without health care insurance with a Presidential veto coming, Indiana is undermining what public health there is, California's plan for universal health care insurnace is finished. Here is what war and occuaption means.

[reason]

As much as I hate Bush's evil war, the reason why the economy has struggled after his deficit spending and tax cuts and historically low interest rates has nothing to do with the fact that much of the spending was on military paychecks, etc.

James Kroeger, surely you remember the Clinton "peace dividend"? When all those bright scientists and engineers otherwise in the pay of pentagon started working for the benefit of the rest of us. The economy is not just financial, it has real parts as well.

[anne]

http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/01/29/an-iraq-recession/

January 29, 2008

An Iraq Recession?
By Paul Krugman

One thing I get asked fairly often is whether the Iraq war is responsible for our economic difficulties. The answer (with slight qualifications) is no.

Just to be clear: I yield to nobody in my outrage over the way we were lied into a disastrous, unnecessary war. But economics isn’t a morality play, in which evil deeds are always punished and good deeds rewarded.

The fact is that war is, in general, expansionary for the economy, at least in the short run. World War II, remember, ended the Great Depression. The $10 billion or so we’re spending each month in Iraq mainly goes to US-produced goods and services, which means that the war is actually supporting demand. Yes, there would be infinitely better ways to spend the money. But at a time when a shortfall of demand is the problem, the Iraq war nonetheless acts as a sort of WPA, supporting employment directly and indirectly.

There is one caveat: high oil prices are a drag on the economy, and the war has some — but probably not too much — responsibility for pricey oil. Mainly high-priced oil is the result of rising demand from China and other emerging economies, colliding with sluggish supply as the world gradually runs out of the stuff. But Iraq would be exporting more oil now if we hadn’t invaded — a million barrels a day? — and that would have kept prices down somewhat.

Overall, though, the story of America’s economic difficulties is about the bursting housing bubble, not the war.

[hari]

America's curse is growing military jingoism...as if you can solve disputes within the international system by the barrel of the gun. And, as long as this kind of mental attitude and intelligence is becoming ingrained even among the educated and liberated, it's a dismal curse on the decline and fall of the great American dream, I'm afraid.

Robertdfineman ...is speaking from his conscience...and this is NOT first time he's argued for a more humanistic approach to statecraft.

My intelligence advises me that American jingoism is NOT likely to look away from military - as opposed to peaceful - solution to international conflicts. The idea of a ABM trigger for resolving global disputes is fatal at best for a great powerful nation!

Implications to budget and economic stability is factored in by %GDP milked annually by the Pentagon - compared to what's allocated to non-military items in the budget.

How else can one explain the dire straight of education, healthcare, manufacturing, and so on and on - compared to OECD countries of comparable economic and financial resource endowments?

[robertdfeinman]

billyblog:
Since you seem to be a relative newcomer you have probably missed the comments where I've made a similar point in the past. So now I tend to skip a couple of steps in my argument.

The missing step is that the US has about 4% of the world population and consumes 30-40% of the resources. Claims that we won't have to consume less as other areas start to consume more just don't add up. There isn't enough "stuff" available or enough raw materials to allow people most people to reach even a reasonable fraction of our standard of living.

So if we continue to use more than our "fair share" we can only do this through some sort of pressure or intimidation. There are two schools on how to maintain our lifestyle: those who favor military intimidation and those who want to use "soft" diplomacy. Saying thank you when you pick someone's pocket sounds like a non-starter to me.

This explains the continuing emphasis on militarism. We are now exploring using space-based weapons systems as a way to provide global intimidation without any worry about defensive measures that could be taken. In fact it is now official US policy that any country who even contemplates working on counter measures will be regarded as an enemy.

China got a pass on their recent test, where they destroyed an orbiting satellite, because it's not a viable technology and we need their Barbie Dolls.

[James Kroeger]

Reason:

Please look at the trade balance. I've told you this before - your simple Keynesianism doesn't work for open economies

Please...an injection into the income-spending stream is an injection and removal of money from that stream is a removal. Remember...ALL ELSE EQUAL, saving money removes money from the economy and spending it puts it back in. That is how we isolate the impact of specific economic variables, by holding all the other variables fixed.

But then you interject to say, "Yeah, but if one of these other variables changes, then the results may not be as you predict." Of course. But how does that invalidate the impact of the changes I'm pointing to? That is your point, isn't it?

Look, if you'd like to step-by-step walk me through the cause-and-effect chain that will ensure that ANY change in taxes/spending will AUTOMATICALLY be offset by changes in the exchange rate, etc., then I'd be happy to become enlightened...

[anne]

I believe Paul Krugman is wrong, simply wrong. This is not the World War when Americans were massively made part of the war effort and the New Deal heritage carried through to providing for the well-being of so many Americans directly and through family involved in the war effort.

Still, I do not know. Was Martin Luther King wrong? Is Iraq actually materially costless? Can we all look forward to living happily in Humvees? Darn. I do not understand, possibly because I do not wish to.

The comments are excellent.

[Craig Nelson]

More on what Chalmers Johnson calls military Keynesianism and its effect on the economy and inflation.

From Johnson's article at Tomgram*:

"On May 1, 2007, the Center for Economic and Policy Research of Washington, D.C., released a study** prepared by the global forecasting company Global Insight on the long-term economic impact of increased military spending. Guided by economist Dean Baker, this research showed that, after an initial demand stimulus, by about the sixth year the effect of increased military spending turns negative. Needless to say, the U.S. economy has had to cope with growing defense spending for more than 60 years. He found that, after 10 years of higher defense spending, there would be 464,000 fewer jobs than in a baseline scenario that involved lower defense spending."

* http://tomdispatch.com/post/174884/chalmers_johnson_how_to_sink_america

** www.cepr.net/documents/publications/military_spending_2007_05.pdf

[Timetheos]

robertdfeinman says
"The missing step is that the US has about 4% of the world population and consumes 30-40% of the resources."

Unfortunately, much of the world relies on this. If we are not spending $150 for a pair of sneakers, how are the oligarchs in China going to make their money? If we don't demand the oil, how is the Royal Saudi family going to surpress it's population?

[Callahan]

The war that is "keepin us safe" is costly, but so is illegal immigration, which is helping to keep us poor:

1. $11 Billion to $22 billion is spent on welfare to illegal aliens each year.

2. $2.2 Billion dollars a year is spent on food assistance
programs such as food stamps, WIC, and free school
lunches for illegal aliens.

3. $2.5 Billion dollars a year is spent on Medicaid for
illegal aliens.

4. $12 Billion dollars a year is spent on primary and
secondary school education for children here illegally
and they cannot speak a word of English!

5. $17 Billion dollars a year is spent for education for the American-born children of illegal aliens, known as anchor babies.

6. $3 Million Dollars a DAY is spent to incarcerate illegal aliens.

7. 30% percent of all Federal Prison inmates are illegal aliens.

8. $90 Billion Dollars a year is spent on illegal aliens for Welfare and Social Services by the American taxpayers.

9. $200 Billion Dollars a year in suppressed American
wages are caused by the illegal aliens.

10. The illegal aliens in the United States have a crime
rate that's two-and-a-half times that of white non-illegal
aliens. In particular, their children, are going to make a
huge additional crime problem in the US.

11. During the year of 2005 there were 4 to 10 MILLION
illegal aliens that crossed our Southern Border also, as
many as 19,500 illegal aliens from Terrorist Countries. Millions of pounds of drugs, cocaine, meth, heroin and marijuana, crossed into the U. S from the Southern border.
Homeland Security Report.

12. The Nationa l Policy Institute, estimated that the total cost of mass deportation would be between $206 and $230 billion or an average cost of between $41 and $46 billion annually over a five year period.

13. In 2006 illegal aliens sent home $45 BILLION in remittances back to their countries of origin.

14. 'The Dark Side of Illegal Immigration:
Nearly One Million Sex Crimes Committed by Illegal
Immigrants In The United States.

Total cost is a whoopin... $338.3 BILLION A YEAR!!!

[hari]

In terms of Political Economy, is it TRUE that US global power can only be measured by its military strategic destructive power advantage and NOT any other factor endowment including non-military and human resources?

[Cynthia]

Be mindful, Keynes, unlike Bush, was NOT a single dimensional thinker!

Keynes was too multidimensional in his thinking to think that it's *unconditionally* the case that war *always* acts to stimulate the economy. Because of this, Keynes would factor in the fact that the Bush war is *unjust*, modifying his statement to read: a war first must be *just* before it can act to stimulate the economy.

Thus it would be an insult to Keynes to have his very positive legacy ties to Bush's very negative one!

[hari]

In terms of Political Economy, is it TRUE that US global power can only be measured by its military strategic destructive power advantage and NOT any other factor endowment including non-military and human resources?

Comparing weapons systems to weapons systems, does China have to invest equivalent (US) amount to counter US global strategic advantage and coercive power influence?

Recall for once...the history of the decline and fall of the Great Roman Empire!

[ken melvin]

Excellent post and comments.

[barry payne - economist]

RDF: Favored sectors (and remember all militarism is funded by the government) alter priorities. The over-militarized society tends to become less efficient and less competitive. With the US facing more vigorous international competitors our lack of internal development puts us at a bigger disadvantage than it did when we were the only player left standing.

The Dim One has merged a "protector savior complex" with the "military industrial complex" into one last Hail Mary pass to salvage his disgraced legacy. The U.S. is no longer a free enterprise system protected externally by security defenses on the international and domestic front.

What was "free, competitive and efficient" has been subsumed under the umbrella of an over-arching security complex which could not manage its way out of a wet paper bag, could not dig a hole much less fill one up without a multi-million dollar contract.

As the Welfare Warrior complex has become part of the underlying platform of "socialism for the rich, capitalism for the poor", it has also started to cannabilize itself, weakening not only defense capability but undermining its egg-laying golden goose.

The Dim One has accomplished in the military and security sector what the financial industry has done in the private sector, except the "bubble" is financed by unitary executive order and the high risks of loss are leveraged on the backs of the country through taxes and debt rather than equity losses.

In the eyes of the Dim One, through which the divine speaks and grants freedom, the chosen are the ones that survive.

says...

"The economist John Maynard Keynes taught us in the 1930s that money spent on guns -- or butter, or even digging ditches and filling them up again -- had the same stimulative effects on a slumping economy."

Surely this is a short term, probably less than one year, truth only.

In the short run digging ditches and filling them in again will be the same as building dams or educating the population because in the very short run the dams aren't completed and part of the population is in school but people still got paid for doing the work, but run the two different policies for six or seven years and instead of better infrastructure and an educated population facilitating growth you have lots of uselessly aerated soil.

That's the Bush economy. What could be, to some extent, effective short term stimulatory policy run for six or seven years so far.

[isaac]

I know the problem in the United States. It is a social problem, not a problem of economics. There are other, much poorer countries in the world that don't have our problems. The problem is that Americans don't care about other people in general. I'm not talking about giving money to homeless people so they can buy whiskey. I'm talking about making the income and health care gap more equal. But most upper/high class people don't care about people below them because we have such a competitive attitude and usually everyone is stretched by someone else above them. I think we really need to start paying people who take out the trash and cook and decent wage. Ever work washing dishes? I have and I don't believe that job should pay a lot, but at least a decent living wage. But no one is willing to pay for things because our culture is so competitive. We don't mind putting others down if we can go up. We don't want to be equal if we can be on top. That is the problem with America. That is why working without a college degree is such a joke now. There is hardly any "on the job training" anymore. Most people are stuck in job and with no opportunity for advancement or money for more schooling/training. The rich people are very skilled at milking as much money as possible out of the average worker with paying the ones at the top much more because they are forced to. I know this because I have worked very low skilled jobs and other office, higher skilled jobs, and the difference is amazing. Thank you for reading.

[mark]

Total cost is a whoopin... $338.3 BILLION A YEAR!!!

Callahan, your hatred of the Bush administration is readily apparent. Despite having complete governmental control from 2000-06, they did not passing any legislation to curb illegal immigration.

Bush and his Republican Congress simply did the obvious- to remain pro-business, they allowed the cheapest workforce in the country to be employed- illegal immigrants. If you think the Democrats are going to change this, you are wrong.

Voting third party this time?

[NLS]

Callahan,

Your illegal immigrant cost of 22+2.2+2.5+12+17+(0.000003*365)+99+200 = 354.7 billion bucks.

FYI: $354,000,000,000
< $3,000,000,000,000

The war is the pressing issue.

[Bruce Wilder]

We might ask about the Iraqi economy.

PK: "the war has some — but probably not too much — responsibility for pricey oil."

I'm sorry, Paul, but this is idiocy. The Iraq War, by preventing all but minimal Iraqi oil production, has had a huge impact on the price of oil. And, I think it reasonable to suppose that has been "by design".

American spending in Iraq is pretty much the whole of the Iraq economy, such as it is.

The best argument I have seen for getting out of Iraq is that American withdrawal would focus Iraqi minds wonderfully on doing what has to be done to get the oil flowing. Without the economic support of the U.S., Iraq has nothing, but oil. The Iraqi civil war might be fierce, but the incentive to make it short would be there in the form of the ability to bring Iraqi oil production on-line.

[robertdfeinman]

Not to get too distracted by immigrant bashing trolls, but where in all those (unsubstantiated) numbers do we see the economic contributions of the immigrants?

Where are the tax revenues that are collected? Where are the payroll taxes that are collected and that are never going to be paid out to these people since they are not in the system?

How about all the economic activity they generate in local communities? After all they need to buy food, clothing and other consumer items just like anyone else. A town in NJ recently passed an ordinance which cracked down on undocumented immigrants (I think it had to do with showing proof of status in order to rent an apartment). Within a few weeks the immigrants left and the downtown business district died, with many stores closing.

The city fathers are now rethinking their policy.

In every age and every place there are always those who are willing to blame the weakest and poorest sector of society for the failings of capitalism. Jews, Roma, Muslims in Liverpool, or Mexicans in Iowa, one must always have a scapegoat. It's so much easier to go after those with no political or economic power.

[anne]

"The Dark Side of Illegal Immigration"

The side of any shade is only the side of mean-spirited creeps who publish such deceit-filled rubbish. Now for a little hatred, to show what these lying creeps really are about.

[NLS]

robertdfeinman says...

"Not to get too distracted by immigrant bashing trolls, but where in all those (unsubstantiated) numbers do we see the economic contributions of the immigrants?"

I was going to mention that too. But I thought just showing the difference between billions and trillions would do the trick.

[calmo]

Dang that's a good line hari "My intelligence advises me that..(not like you others...who are just shooting wildly, unadvised...and hence the urgency to set you straight...)". I shall bring this nuance (my possibly non-conforming intelligence) up with my advisers directly.

Rethinking about this ("My intelligence advises me that..."), it is also a line that could have come from Movie...with such a different effect.

Callahan (whose apparent hatred of the Bush administration is completely clouded over for me by his hatred for illegal aliens) [See foregoing point re my possible faulty intelligence] (who would dare to claim that someone else's intelligence was AWOL?..not me), are you familiar with the WSJ story that the estimate of 12M illegals derives from an IRS record of tax and SS deductions on 11M checks? So I'd be interested in your sources to combat my preconceptions about these wage slaves who are not only over-represented in the construction industry, but also in fatalities --not only in the mining industry...but that war in Iraq.
The things I think I know...

[BJ Feng]

Sure illegal immigrants contribute to the economy, but they take much more from our society than give to it. You're telling me an illegal is a net positive (despite all studies focusing on ILLEGAL aliens indicate they are a net drain) when they make meager wages and send a good portion of those wages back home? Money from illegals is the #2 source of income for Mexico, behind oil. So magically they can make minimum wage or less, send a lot of money home, AND spend enough to be a net benefit?

Wow. I guess it has to be in the same magical world where peacekeepers who want to prevent the same tragedy of genocide we see happening in Darfur, are really invaders instead.

No Anne, this isn't the same kind of effort we had in WWII. That's because we're not even fighting yet. We can sacrifice nothing, and continue fighting on both fronts in the Middle East indefinitely. Reports on the demise of the American military are greatly exaggerated.

[mark]

i am actually very pro-immigrant. I think the path to citizenship is the way to go. I also think increasing the penalties on businesses who employ them should be increased and enforced- but only after a clear process is standardized to allow existing immigrants in the US to become citizens in a timely manner. I just think the Republicans were more than happy to not pass any laws regarding immigration, and instead pass the profits onto their employers and the bill onto the taxpayers.

[donna]

Uh, huh, Callahan,

And how much did the illegal immigrants contribute to the economy through their labor, save their employers since their labor was cheap, save YOU since you can afford to buy your groceries, contribute in taxes that they will never see returned, contribute by having children here who WILL be citizens and who will grow up to pay their taxes and contribute to your social security, etc, etc, etc.....

Get over yourself already. They don't hurt you they HELP you - and the government lets them in because they know that, and then tell YOU different to get you pissed off at the illegals who are "taking your jobs" (which you would never want to do the jobs they do anyway) and so you'll keep voting for them while they favor the policies of the rich that keep you poor and unemployed.

Do you get it yet? Wake up already. Stop listening to Rush, start reading here, and LEARN SOMETHING.

Enough. Learn or go away.

[hari]

Calmo -

You're of course brilliant to a fault...!

May I suggest with your intelligence in a debating society it'd NOT fail (ever) to identify "pros" and "cons" of an issue under consideration ... without some disinformation.

[hari]

Calmo -

You're of course brilliant to a fault...!

May I suggest with your intelligence in a debating society it'd NOT fail (ever) to identify "pros" and "cons" of an issue under consideration ... without some disinformation.

[dirtyal]

"The fact is that war is, in general, expansionary for the economy, at least in the short run."

I maybe agree about wars being expansionary in the short run if the economy really needs stimulation. If the economy is not operating at close to full employment, it expands the economy to employ the unemployed resources.

The real questions are:

1) How long is the short run?
2) What happens when we start running short on labor or raw materials? What happens then?

My recollection of the ten years after our departure from Viet Nam is that we were still paying for that war via inflation and economic dislocation.

"Post hoc, ergo propeter hoc"?--I don't think so. I think that there was a direct connection between Johnson's obsession over both the Great Society and the Viet Nam war, the politically expedient argument that we could have both guns and butter, and the ultimate inflation that the era produced.

In my view, we are well past the time when the war can be considered expansionary and into the time when it will certainly be considered inflationary.

[calmo]

O hariKrishna (Ok, I am nervous about you suddenly switching to Norwegian your home language and giving me a mindful.), making remarks about my challengedendangered follicle densityhair style specimen has not been a successful strategy in winning my affections in the past.
Where exactly is this debating society, again? And not to be too obtuse or anything (I'm currently in Clive Crook mode...blunt.), but why should we (me and my famous huddling advisers guiding every character in this string...so far) give any proclamations about (my, but hey, yours maybe?) intelligence from you...the time of day?
Presumptuous.
I am unfinessable. (Do you play bridge?)
And not here to win some....debate. Seriously, is that you, hari?

[NLS]

Oops, messed up. I meant

$354,000,000,000
< $3,000,000,000,000/5 = 600,000,000,000

[anne]

"Wow. I guess it has to be in the same magical world where peacekeepers who want to prevent the same tragedy of genocide we see happening in Darfur, are really invaders instead."

Wow. This is a crazed lie. I guess there are monsters and monsters; the point of being a monster being to lie at all costs.

[skeptonomist]

Just about everyone says that WW II ended the depression, but this is only partially true. Once the economy hit bottom in 1933, GDP growth bounced back immediately and there were three excellent years. After the recession of 1937 GDP bounced back again. Employment recovered much more slowly but was improving again after 1938. International trade and military spending did not pick up until 1941 - this is when the war stimulation began.

The war put everyone back to work in a hurry, but the economy was on a recovery path several years before that.

[anne]

"Wow. I guess it has to be in the same magical world where peacekeepers who want to prevent the same tragedy of genocide we see happening in Darfur, are really invaders instead."

This is a lie beyond any moral sense, beyond all shame and dignity. Imagine the crazed viciousness..

[BJ Feng]

"WASHINGTON – Someone has finally fixed an approximate taxpayer cost of between 12 million and 15 million illegal aliens residing in the U.S.

A new study by the Heritage Foundation's Robert Rector found a household headed by an individual without a high school education, including about two-thirds of illegal aliens, costs U.S. taxpayers more than $32,000 in federal, state and local benefits. That same family contributes an average of $9,000 a year in taxes, resulting in a net tax burden of $22,449 each year.

Over the course of the household's lifetime that tax burden translates to $1.1 million.

If the lower figure of 12 million illegal aliens is used for estimation purposes, the total tax burden translates to $2.2 trillion.

"Would any of us buy shares in a company that we knew would produce a loss of a million dollars a share," asks Rep. Steve King, R-Iowa, in response to the study. "Cheap labor is not cheap at the cost of over a million dollars per head of household."

Rector's study, "The Fiscal Cost of Low-Skill Households to the U.S. Taxpayer," examines the economics of the 17.7 million American households made up of people without a high-school degree. Using numbers from the Census Bureau, the Congressional Research Service, the Bureau of Labor Standards and other government agencies, Rector determined what they earn, what they spend and what they receive in government services.

About half of the 17.7 million households studied are illegal aliens. About two-thirds of illegal alien households are headed by someone without a high school degree. Only 10 percent of native-born Americans fit into that category.

"Over the next ten years the total cost of low-skill households to the taxpayer (immediate benefits minus taxes paid) is likely to be at least $3.9 trillion," Rector writes. "This number would go up significantly if changes in immigration policy lead to substantial increases in the number of low-skill immigrants entering the country and receiving services."

I believe the facts are clear.

[NLS]

Hey BJ, I hate to break it to ya, but the Heritage Foundation consists of a bowl of nerdshits who really don't care about you.

[anne]

What matters, all that matters is that because of repeated lies and invoked fears and prejudices, we immorally invaded another country and occupied that country in an effort at subjugation that has led to the deaths of hundreds of thousands, the wounding of hundreds of thousands, the loss of homes of millions, the destruction of centuries of heritage, the destruction of community on community, the waste of trillions of necessary dollars.

That is what matters beyond the monsters who would rave about immigration and peacekeeping. What we have loosed has driven millions to be immigrants and destroyed peace. We have become the masters of war, and are destroying our heritage.

[kthomas]

Ah, BJ, the true believer.

[anne]

There is a fierce irony to knowing the the very title American Heritage means the subversion of our American heritage.

[Bruce Wilder]

"I think . . . should . . . , but only after . . ." makes for a wonderfully flexible political grammar.

[Patricia Shannon]

Mexican immigrants are good for the makers of big bass sound systems to the Mexicans, and ear plugs to the rest of us. Before you start calling me names, tell us how many neighbors you have who are Mexican immigrants. Except for me and my next-door neighbors on one side, all of the people on my block are Mexican immigrants. And since I live in a mobile -home park, I have a lot of neighbors.

[Ben Stein the Hack]

Why did this get turned into an immigration debate?

BJ Feng: On your claim that we can prosecute wars in both Iraq and Afghanistan at no cost, that's frankly a bit retarded.

From a military standpoint, by all accounts we pulled resources out of Afghanistan to invade and occupy Iraq. By many accounts this is the single reason we have failed to capture Osama bin Laden to date. At the same time, recruiting has become so desperate that they have now significantly lowered their standards (you might actually consider going now that you apparently qualify), including accepting those with criminal records. We have no signs to date that we are close to fulfilling the goals we set forth for occupying Iraq and Afghanistan. And we are using the National Guard at a shockingly unprecedented level, which will basically decimate the NG going forward.

On an economic level, the conservative estimate of costs is either $2 trillion or $3 trillion, depending on your source. That does not include things like the loss of productivity for maimed and dead soldiers, the loss of soft power for American geopolitics, the cost of America's image for American exports, or the opportunity costs associated with these expenditures.

So pardon me if I strenuously disagree with you to the point of thinking you're a twit. I don't think I need to read anymore about your views on immigration or anything else, quite frankly.

[evagrius]

I'm numerically challenged by these figures.

Am I right in assuming that the total spent on Iraq figures to around $30k per person there, ( population 27 mill)?

If so...couldn't the U.S. just have given them the money. The Iraquis would have been so American that victory could have ben declared easily.

[ken melvin]

Evagrius, Saddam offered to leave for what, $4billion?

[NLS]

Actually, he only wanted a billion bucks!

http://www.crooksandliars.com/2007/09/28/saddam-wanted-out-bush-lied-about-it/

[James Killus]

Hey, I asked the last time this came up and got no answer, so I'll ask it again. Where exactly in the works of J. M. Keynes does he say that it makes no difference what sort of spending "stimulus" was employed to a slumping economy. I could have sworn that I've seen references to "multiplier" effects in at least the neo-Keynesean literature, and I'm damned if I can see how a smart fellow like Keynes believed that there was no difference between spending money to grow food and spending money to burn down apple orchards.

Let me also suggest that perhaps James Kroeger has a point, and that in times past, it proved easier to raise marginal tax rates on very high incomes during times of war than during times of peace, while wars invariably created labor shortages which tended to enhance incomes on the low end. That would mean that war isn't what improved economies in times past, it's just that wars allowed the policies that would improve economic efficiency.

[anne]

"No ----, this isn't the same kind of effort we had in WWII. That's because we're not even fighting yet."

Imagine, the monster who is beyond understanding what has happened in Iraq in these almost 5 nightmare years. Repeatedly, as I was shown this afternoon but as barely noticed by the press, our Defense Department officers describe massive attacks through Iraq. Where several days ago there were 40,000 pounds of bombs loosed by us, there was a mere mention that another 100,000 pounds of bombs were dropped days after that. The point being, I understand, to show that we can do far better than a mere 40,000 pounds.

We are ever so careful, I understand, in recording the tons of bombs we drop in all openness because there is never a complaint, while we are as careful not to count the dead unless we create a count of al-Quaeda killed, and every person killed everywhere is always al-Qaeda who were never in Iraq before we occupdied Iraq but are everywhere all the time now.

[Craig Nelson]

"Why did this get turned into an immigration debate?" Because trolls are so cute when they break into a discussion, poke a dirty finger into your chest, and babble about their unrelated idee fixe, that few can resist feeding them.

@ dirtyal. Deficit defense spending not only causes consumer inflation since wages are being paid but no goods are being produced, but it stifles technological progress. Defense spending may be only 5% of the economy, but it employs a disproportionate share of scientists and engineers who could be better employed. I think it also contributes to the trade deficit.

[anne]

Paul Krugman is completely right, the war and occupation have not brought us a recession, but Krugman is wrong in failing to write of what a 1 or 2 or 3 trillion dollar war and occupation have meant for the well being of Americans. This immoral action has been at the indirect expense of increasing death and misery here and elsewhere in terms of what we are unwilling to do for as much as caring properly for pregnant women and infants in Mississippi and elsewhere in the South.

When California abandons even a effort a universal health care as on this day, Iraq is the reason the funding is not there. Military spending has bolstered the economy somewhat, though obviously less so than during wars past, but the bolstering has been at an expense to America's middle class and poor that is terrible indeed.

[chris]

Aside from the obscene cruelty of the war on Iraq, the money it has cost could have been used to better the lives of Americans. That Bush and the Neocons preferred to engage in a stupid neo-imperial fiasco says a great deal about what kind of people they are: stupid, amoral, immoral, wicked and disgusting. Someday Americans may wake up to how they were cheated and deceived and misused. Let us hope it finishes off the Republican party for good. The perpetrators and their minions deserve to suffer for their evil misdeeds.

[dirtyal]

Note to James and Anne: WWII was much different than anything we have experienced since. If there is such a thing as a "just war" this was it. And, forget the "guns and butter" argument. There was mostly guns. The butter was saved for the soldiers and government workers.

The only think that most people could do with their money was spend it on real estate or invest it in Wall Street. A relatively small group of smart people made buckets of money during WWII by investing in companies of all descriptions that had been converted from peace industries to war industries.

There was really not much to "consume" so people didn't really object to paying relatively high taxes and buying bonds. What there was to consume was in short supply, cost a lot, and was not that attractive--nothing like today.

I was actually thinking about this question while walking out to get my lunch today. Maybe "just wars" are better than "unjust wars" because people are willing to make sacrifices in the former but not the latter. The only way that our government is able to get us into unjust wars is by telling all of us that it won't affect us that much. If we had to sacrifice for Viet Nam or Iraq the way people sacrificed for WWII, both would have been over in less than two years.

[dirtyal]

Note to Craig Nelson: God bless you!!!!

[anne]

While Defense Department officers boast of our dropping 100,000 pounds of bombs on Iraq days ago, they somehow do not know that so many years ago Nazis pilots dropped 100,000 pounds of bombs on the Spanish town of Guernica. Reports through the world on the destruction of Guernica were frightening and appalling, and when Pablo Picasso learned of Guernica in Paris he painted what was among the most important anti-war protests of the century.

Guernica, a massive work, hung in protest against the Nazis at the World Fair, then Guernica hung in Paris and New York because Picasso would not allow the work in Spain before Spain was a free country. I have seen Guernicas in free Spain, but I saw the work bofre in New York at the United Nations.

A tapestry of Guernica hangs before the United Nation Security Council auditorium, and when Colin Powell went to speak of war on Iraq Guernica was covered over not to embarass those who would cry war.

Today we are pleased to tell of dropping 100,000 pounds of bombs on Iraq. We know nothing or history, we care nothing save for possibly being embarassed.

[anne]

D, I understand and appreciate the comment as so many others through the thread.

I know the World War was different, though altogether terrible nonetheless, but I know there is need for pacifism now when pacifism is forgotten and we are deceived and bullied and frightened to war where there should be no war.

[Icarus]

Almost 100% of Federal Income Tax Revenue is paid for by the top 50% of income earners in the US. And, almost 80% of the Federal Income Tax Revenue is paid for by the top 20% of income earners in the US.

The point?...The was is being paid for by the top 20% of income earners in the US.

The image of digging ditches and filling them up is perhaps appropriate. We build bombs, and pay uneducated soldiers to monitor our bombings and the aftermath. The tragedy is that innocent people are dead, or have fled. None of our 'cost' estimates can measure the value of the lives we've destroyed.

It's easy to as well point at Bush/Cheney, but, the Democrats are complicit. They don't have the strength to stop funding this illegal attack. This is the problem...we have a Criminal Executive branch, and a Legislative Branch which resembles a corrupt police force. They look away when the murder is being perpetrated on their watch.

[James Killus]

dirtyal,

WWII was a "just war" in hindsight, when people learned that all the anti-Axis propaganda was true, and didn't even go far enough in some cases.

But during the war itself, it was hard to know that, because the same tales had been told before, the enemy is always committing attrocities, you see, so people had to take everything on faith. And in their faith, they did some pretty unpleasant things as well, interning American citizens (and what were the Japanese propagandists telling their people about that, at the time?), inventing new and interesting ways of killing civilians, with firestorms, carpet bombing and then nuclear weapons. Curtis LeMay noted that, had the Allies lost the war, he'd have been facing a War Crimes trial and the old bastard was right about that. It was, in fact, a stipulation at Nuremberg that the commission of similar acts by the Allies was not a defence that could be used by German war criminals.

Even WWII fails a most fundamental test of war: it did not threaten the existence of the United States as a political entity. There have maybe been three wars in U.S. history that pass that test (Revolution, 1812, and Civil, and the War of 1812 probably does not qualify, I think).

But every war is sold as an existential threat, and every war is bought on the same basis. And since every war is also about who owns the future of the country, even the deranged true believers have a point. But they have lost the future in any case; the only question is how many other futures they murder out of spite.

[dirtyal]

Anne:

"We know nothing or history, we care nothing save for possibly being embarassed."

Cheney and Bush both know about unjust wars and how they get started. They were part of the lucky and elite who were able to avoid having their lives disrupted in the 60's. They both should know better. Their actions cannot be explained as those of people who do not understand history. They were a part of it. They thought they had found a formula to consolidate power and make money for themselves and their friends. That's all they care about.

In fact, they knew so much about history that they figured out how to use the National Guard as a surrogate for draftees. Talk about "bait and switch". When Bush was in the Air National Guard (don't believe any of the BS about him applying to go active and serve in Viet Nam) the chance of serving in Viet Nam was about 1 in 1000 or more. It really was voluntary for someone to be called up and serve.

So, in comes the all volunteer army, smaller and more effective. Where do they get the "cannon fodder"? Call up the reserves--over and over and over.

Cheney and Bush got out of serving during Viet Nam, while millions of their less fortunate counterparts were drafted, went to war for two years, got killed, got maimed, got sprayed with agent orange, got PTSD, became life long drug addicts etc. etc.

These are really bad guys. They are not just people who don't understand history. They are elitists who have absolutely no empathy for their fellow Americans.

Sorry about the rant. I didn't intend it to be one. But I really believe strongly in this subject.

Note to Anne: I saw a movie about Guernica when I was in high school. Truly amazing. Most people don't even know that it happened.

[anne]

D, telling and helpful.

[dirtyal]

James: I used up all my energy in my ranting above. I really can't disagree with what you said in your post.

I was too young to understand what was going on during WWII. But I knew a lot from what my parents and their friends spoke about.

One of my dad's friends had a brother who went ashore at Omaha Beach. He actually made it through the fighting. My God Mother had a son who was a navy pilot. He was killed.

It's all pretty relative. So, let's just say that WWII was supported by most of the population because they considered it to be a "just war". We were attacked without warning, our friends in England, France and elsewhere were threatened as viable nations, and we had fears that we could not go it alone if all of Europe was under Nazi control.

But, by gum, you are right about all the excesses that we perpetrated ourselves.

Finally, however, I restate my point: "if we had to sacrifice during Viet Nam and Iraq the way my parents' generation sacrificed during WWII, both would have been over in less than two years."

[ken melvin]

Well said anne.

[Craig Nelson]

The WWII economy is very interesting. The US GDP exploded -- demand-side economics and governmental planning and control. Ken Burns showed the labor effect with rural subsistence farmers becoming shipwrights and underemployed women becoming Rosie the Riveter. Not only was butter rationed, but bacon grease was collected as feedstock for glycerine production. However, although war allowed use of otherwise forbidden GDP maximization strategies, it was probably not a net economic benefit if countries in which the war was fought are included in the sum.

The US produces the deadliest and most desirable weapons in the world because we spend more than any other country on military R&D. The M1 Abrams and F-22 supersonic stealth fighter are jaw-droppingly marvelous machines. So is the Toyota Prius, but I'd be surprised if its development budget exceeded the several billion dollars spent on the V-22 Osprey. The target of spending does matter.

[anne]

The Los Angeles Times deserves considerable praise for this essential editorial, as does Mark Thoma for highlighting the editorial and question.

Then, too, I am thinking of whether length of an admitted but wildly unfortunate stimulus matters. Is there never a point of when there is more drain than stimulus? After all, we are agreed the stimulus is self-defeatingly directed from a sustained development perspective. But, when does is long-term begin?

[piglet]

"That would mean that war isn't what improved economies in times past, it's just that wars allowed the policies that would improve economic efficiency."

It should be noted that in past wars, at least in the World Wars, government tended to exert more control on the economy. (*) It was obvious to everybody during war that vital sectors of the economy couldn't just be left to "free market" forces. And war often had the (unintended) effect of reducing inequality. War also implied full employment.

It is one of the most amazing aspects of the Iraq war that exactly the opposite happened in these respects. War served as a cover to outsource and privatize even more government functions, and it certainly had the effect of increasing inequality.

(*) Bertrand Russell even cited the WWI war economy as evidence that socialism works. After all, he argued, the British economy continued to function and to provide for all basic needs of the population under government control, despite the fact that so much of the country's resources (including the productivity of most of the male labour force) were diverted into the war effort. If a controlled economy can work so efficiently during war, how much more productive could it be made to work in times of peace? I find this argument quite challenging. Really, how much could have been achieved if those soldiers could have been made productive instead of killing each other?

[Craig Nelson]

"Guided by economist Dean Baker, this research showed that, after an initial demand stimulus, by about the sixth year the effect of increased military spending turns negative."

I'm not an economist, which shocks no one, but is there something silly about the CEPR study that I'm clueless about?

[piglet]

I agree that trolls shouldn't be fed but that Heritage study is such a gem. It's argument goes like that: Workers with a low educational level are paid so little by their employers that society must subsidize them. Therefore, if there were no low-skilled workers, society would save a bunch of money! And since many undocumented workers are low-skilled, they cost society money. One wonders whether those Heritage guys really believe that if all the minimum wage workers only had High School degrees, they would immediately get a pay rise. Or, alternatively, that low-paying jobs like washing dishes and collecting trash would suddeny become redundant and be replaced by higher-paying jobs for people with High School degrees, just because more people have that degree.

Maybe the people at Heritage even believe that if everybody had a PhD, then everybody would be offered a nice think tank job and nobody would be doing any dirty work any more. Oops, there I made a mistake. Of course, they would still be doing dirty work at the think tank.

[Craig Nelson]

Piglet says, "(w)ar served as a cover to outsource and privatize even more government functions." Basically a very cynical and transparent skim. US outsources logistics (KBR), security (Blackhawk), and intelligence (???) to private contractors. Surprise, surprise they are generous campaign donors and in some cases for generations. To Republicans. Good point, Piglet.

[skeptonomist]

Speaking of the Vietnam war, there was a recession right in the middle of it, bottoming in 1970 - another reason not to be surprised at the lack of stimulation of the Iraq war.

And speaking of Keynes, did he really say that cutting taxes and/or spending more (military or not) would *always* be stimulative? In any case we know empirically this is not true.

[anne]

Skeptonomist:

"Speaking of the Vietnam war, there was a recession right in the middle of it, bottoming in 1970 - another reason not to be surprised at the lack of stimulation of the Iraq war."

Huh? I didn't realize that, since I only looked at the level of growth through the Johnson and Nixon years. Thank you.

Fred says...

It isn't that our economy is so weak that we need huge amounts of war stimulus to keep from collapsing, but rather than we are leaking demand to foreign trade, at the rate of about 6% of GDP. The obvious solution i