War and Money

Econo-Girl was inspired by the Lazy Iguana's post about the economic effect of wars. You can see her long-winded comment at the end of his post.

Generally speaking, when people wage war they want to win. Even if that means borrowing. What government, after all, has a rainy-day war fund just for moments like these? None. When they can scratch the backs of supporters, who cares about preparing for tomorrow's conflict? No politician I've ever seen.

One piece that I'd like to examine is the military-industrial complex and its role in our armed conflicts. That is NOT TO EVEN REMOTELY suggest they seek and encourage war, but as a significant economic force they must be included as part of the picture.

The Federal Government is the largest employer in the U.S. The military accounts for billions of dollars in spending on manufacturing and research. That's a lot of jobs. So the whole concept of 'who wins the military contract' has big political implications. Where is the military base going
to be located? Who voted for the winning candidate? Where are the jobs going to be? In what industry? How much did that major defense contractor give the Senator?

Who's back is getting scratched in all this spending?

The lobbying pressure applied when one type of defense weapon is being scrapped is phenomenal. There's a lot of people invested in keeping it. So they lobby and pay for ads and whine to their Congressman about how their equipment is really the best one out there. "You can't get rid of it! The other thing doesn't work!"

So the decision on the best weapon for our boys becomes linked to who voted for whom and how good their lobbyists are.

Sad, huh?