How much does the US spend on Military as opposed to the production of goods?
February 28th, 2010 by eranio
I’m doing a project on the topic of "Guns or Butter" and I want to give points of reference so people can understand what the United States chooses to do. I was easily able to find the military spending for the US in 2009 but manufacturing is a different story as I cannot find it. Thanks for the help!
Posted in military guns
February 28th, 2010 at 12:45 am
See http://www.census.gov/manufacturing/m3/adv/pdf/durgd.pdf
February 28th, 2010 at 12:45 am
1. The ‘butter" in "guns vs. butter" has almost nothing to do with manufacturing. It is about military expenditures (guns) vs. private consumption of goods and services (butter).
Similarly, "guns" includes all "current" military spending including weapons, pay for military personnel, and pay for civilian employees of the military (for some reason, money spent on veterans is not included as part of the military budget, which makes true comparison harder).
2. The simplest comparison is just total military (i.e. Department of Defense) expenditures as a percentage of GDP.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_budget_of_the_United_States
For current GDP estimates:
https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/us.html