Comment by DrFalkyn
15 days ago
It’s not for free. It’s in return for being under the US security umbrella, which costs the US about $800 billion a year
Of course that umbrella could soon be gone, so it would be a moot point
15 days ago
It’s not for free. It’s in return for being under the US security umbrella, which costs the US about $800 billion a year
Of course that umbrella could soon be gone, so it would be a moot point
The umbrella could already be gone. There are big question marks over how much the in-practice umbrella looks like the Ukraine war where the US State Department provokes something then Japan gets flattened in the crossfire. How much should they be paying for that?
People are coming out of the 90s mindset where the US was substantially more important than its competitors. It was easily worth paying for US protection then because it was obvious the US could back it up with muscle. Now the calculation is a lot less clear.
Of that 800 billion, where is the money spent? If it goes to US military/industrial complex, it is basically a creator of US jobs.
So it doesn't cost the US anything.
This is "broken window fallacy"[1] territory. In economic terms defense spending is mostly waste because a lot of it doesn't get used (hopefully) or gets used to blow other stuff up causing net damage. The fact that it creates jobs is better than nothing, but spending the same money on infrastructure would increase the future productivity of the country.
[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parable_of_the_broken_window
The defense budget is a social support program that conservatives will agree to. Rather than just providing people a basic income and healthcare directly, they add the hoop of holding down a job to access it.
It also is meant to keep American industry active (to some degree) in case it is needed.
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