Published: 5/14/2021 4:13:08 PM
I am writing in regards to the column by H. Patricia Hynes about military spending (“Elephants in the room: Tax day 2021,” April 29). Let’s look at a pie chart of the federal budget. Put the pie on the table. Let’s look at it.
Let’s discuss it like adults and make a reasonable decision based on current needs and realities. For too long we have been zombies marching into the future with our arms straight out saying, “Must-Have-Giant-Defense-Spending.” Stop. Put the pie on the table.
Maybe we need all this giant defense spending, maybe we could reduce it. Like any business or personal budget, the government has both fixed costs and discretionary spending. Mandatory spending on things like Social Security are about two-thirds of our federal budget. The other one-third is discretionary spending, where we can choose where to put our money.
We use roughly half of our discretionary budget on the military. Why? Do we need to do that in 2021? One serious red flag is that we spend around three times as much money on defense as China, the next biggest military spender. We are like a store that is spending half of its money on alarm systems and security guards while our biggest competitor spends one-third as much.
Heck, we spend ten times as much as the third biggest military spender, India. It’s overkill and then some. If we reduced military spending by 10%, we would still be the biggest military power by far.
We need to have a national discussion about military spending. There is too much money at stake. Think of all the important programs we could support with those billions of dollars. Let’s do the budget. Put the pie on the table.
John Reily
Florence
May 15, 2021 at 03:17AM
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