Cost Of Military Jet Could House Every Homeless Person In U.s. With 600,000 Home

Discussion in 'Politics' started by Earth Ling, Jul 12, 2014.

  1. It's no news that a large portion of our federal tax dollars goes towards defense spending. But your jaw might drop at the cost of the newest jet manufactured by the U.S. military, and just how much good could have been achieved domestically with the same price tag.

    The $400 billion program to create a fleet of F-35 Joint Strike Fighter jets, which, as The Hill points out, is seven years behind scheduleand chronically plagued with misfortunes and incompetencies, could have housed every homeless person in the U.S. with a $600,000 home.

    The staggering fact, configured by Think Progress, is just one of several figures the news source put into perspective for taxpayers. For example, the amount spent per year to build the F-35 jets could easily fulfill a $16.7 billion request by the United Nations Office of Coordination for Humanitarian Affairsto save countless livesfrom preventable causes around the world - and then have enough left over to fund UNICEF's budget request, too. The full cost of the jets program could also fund the National School Lunch Program, which feeds about 31 million students annually, for the next 24 years.

    The mind-boggling cost for a fleet of F-35 jets exemplifies what Steven Conn would consider a military budget that doesn't have much of a positive impact on everyday Americans.

    "Spending our taxes on the military doesn't yield much to make our lives or our communities better," Conn, a professor and Director of the Public History Program at Ohio State University, wrote on a HuffPost blog in April. "Big weapons systems and overseas military installations, to say nothing of feckless military adventures in Vietnam or Iraq, have done very little to fix our roads, improve our kids' education, or push the boundaries of medical research."

    According to data provided by the Office of Management and Budget, the federal government spent roughly 19 times moreon defense and international security assistance than it did on education in 2013. A graph created by the Peter G. Peterson Foundation illustrates that the U.S. spends more on defense than China, Russia, Saudi Arabia, France, the U.K., Germany, Japan and India combined.

    http://m.huffpost.com/us/entry/5575045?ncid=txtlnkusaolp00000592
     
  2. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gg-jvHynP9Y
     
    He was no peacenik either.
     
  3. "Defense" spending? More doublespeak from our Orwellian overlords...
     
  4. Its a bit overwhelming to read those numbers....
     
    But i mean.
    If you wanna talk about cutting spending and spending it on things the country ACTUALLY needs??
     
    i can think of a thousand other things we could spend less on besides the military, thats actually far less important to everyday americans than a fleet of jets.
     
    Not saying we SHOULDNT spend maybe a little less on some of the military aspects....but i wouldnt want the military to start looking like shit and our defense drastically get shitty.
     
  5. #5 goober0331, Jul 12, 2014
    Last edited by a moderator: Jul 12, 2014
     
    I think its ok if they cut juuuuuuuuuussssst a little bit.... if not a significant amount more.
     
    http://pgpf.org/Chart-Archive/0053_defense-comparison
     
  6. Thats what im saying. Cut some but dont go hacking the shit into pieces to the point that its ruined or underfunded even.
     
    considering the military, that would probably be a bad idea.
     
    what about corporate spending? in general corporate spending. i mean....those numbers are probably pretty overwhelming also. and imo far less important than the fucking military. 
     
  7.  
    Do you mean corporate welfare? Thats in the tens of billions if I recall.
     
    I mean, the USA could cut military spending by 50% and still surpass that of Russia and China combined.
     
  8. welfare? i guess, not too sure on that one. 
     
    but i mean...is that really realistic ? to cut it 50%? thats a pretty big number. I envision that going wrong in so many places..
     
  9.  
    I dont think I've ever heard the term corporate spending when people are talking about government spending, thats why I thought you meant corporate welfare. Can you maybe be more specific?
     
    I think the US spends way to much on the military in the first place, so thats my opinion. 50% would be a lot yes, but when you think about all the military bases across the globe, they seem rather unnecessary, imo. You can decrease the military and not decrease the defense.
     
  10. #10 Sam_Spade, Jul 12, 2014
    Last edited by a moderator: Jul 12, 2014
    I'm a big supporting of cutting military funding - eviscerating it - and putting a lot of the savings into funding domestic volunteer programs, aimed at a variety of demographics.
     
    The dividends from these kind of investments are.... incredible. Absolutely incredible. You get more than your investment back, you directly contribute to building infrastructure, experiential education, and growing the social cohesion of communities. If you want to defend your communities from the evils of the world - that's the best way to do it, not hide being a wall of jet fighters and battleships that comes with a legacy of wounds; both mental and physical, and breeds hatred in far away lands.
     
    Consider that the US Peace Corps only annual budget is less than $400 million a year - and that there is no real domestic version. If you took less that one half of a percent from the F-35 development budget... you could change the United States, and all generations to come for the better.
     
    EDIT: I took part of such a program that existed in my country when I was a youngster. It's long gone now, was axed as part of bogus austerity measures, despite mountains of evidence to the benefits of it. It changed my life, and those of my friends, in ways that we still are surprised to discover. It's the spark of my ongoing volunteerism to this day.
     
  11. By corporate i meant like. Big ass companies in general. Like the suits behind the businesses.
    The ones outsourcing jobs to save money and in turn make more money. multiple off shore untaxed bank accounts.
     
    american money that doesnt come back into america. 
     
    I mean, ideally maybe the one world economy would work in situations like this since everythhing has become so expansive.
     
    but it doesnt work like that yet. so theres big numbers being pumped out, and not circulating back in.
     
    i could be wrong or delusional, or have a twisted perspective on things. but ive read a lot about things like that.
     
    Theres too many people in this country getting paid way more than they should for what they do. While the other half is getting underpaid for what they do.
     
    There are soooo many things we could change right now to actually save our country some money.
     
  12. misleading title, the 400 billion number comes from a fleet of these new jets. that could be reasonable depending how large the fleet is, but your excerpt makes no mention of that. 
     
  13. 1,763 F-35s is the number the U.S. has ordered.
     
    The F-35 is designed to replace the F-16 (827 in service -- introduced in 1978) and the F-15s/F-15Es (254 F-15C/Ds in service, 219 F-15Es -- introduced in 1976 and 1988 respectively.)
     
    The context is that this order of jets is replacing a fleet that's 2 or 3 decades old. It's an extension of the already-existing military industrial complex, rather than some new & shocking thing.
     
    FWIW this is how the U.S. lays waste to other countries. Now, the question of course is: why do we want to keep laying waste to other countries? Who's benefiting from it? Answer, as far as I can tell, is the corporations that manufacture these jets.
     
    War's big business! Can't go stopping up jobs. 100,000 Iraqis killed by Coalition troops? Who cares -- at least some American corporations weren't put out of business. Same thing happened in Vietnam.
     
  14. if we use our "defense " money to help the sick and homeless, the terrorists win.
     
  15. the force is strong with this one
     
  16. There's also 8 other countries going in on this deal.. hence the "joint strike" part. So that bill total might not be all on the US, but I'm sure we will all still pretend it is.
     
  17. Actually, if you cut the military, you create more unemployment, thus more homelessness.
     
  18. Isnt that some shit? Maybe refocus some of the military tax dollars to another sector and deploy the military employees there? For instance, build better V.A. hospitals with modern technology. There has to be a better placement of these tax dollars. Bombing other countries, paying to rebuild them and foreign aid just isnt working anymore
     
  19. #19 LuxSpiritus, Jul 15, 2014
    Last edited by a moderator: Jul 15, 2014
    The government budget spends more than 10% on military. I think it's pointless, our military is so useless. They send them to another country to get picked off. Why don't they send them to North Korea and get them all Nuked. The military are pawns of the government. I discorouge every person who wants to join the military. It's disgraceful not honorable at all. Their not hero's, they're not protecting our country. They're invading another country causing casualties. Military benefits are dumb also. The G.I. Bill gives full scholorship to any college for veterans. Stupidest thing i've ever seen. They suddenly are better than everyone else cause they're willing to kill for our piece of shit country. It's a disgrace. The Peace Corps is a better government program in my opinion. I have noticed a lot of people who lack the intelligence to do something important who feel the need to join the military. We would be better off funding support programs. and helping our country, instead of ruining anothers. I hate america.
     
  20. Say what you want about the morality of our military industrial complex, this is it in action. This is going to be a cash cow. They are going to sell these fuckers. Then if needed maintain air superiority with the F-22 which the airforce claims is unmatched by any known or projected fighter jet. The upkeep and repair and parts will turn a fortune in sales.
     

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