America’s biggest -- and only major -- jobs program is the U.S. military.More at the Salon link.
Over 1,400,000 Americans are now on active duty; another 833,000 are in the reserves, many full time. Another 1,600,000 Americans work in companies that supply the military with everything from weapons to utensils...
If we didn’t have this giant military jobs program, the U.S. unemployment rate would be over 11.5 percent today instead of 9.5 percent...
Having a giant undercover military jobs program is an insane way to keep Americans employed. It creates jobs we don’t need but we keep anyway because there’s no honest alternative. We don’t have an overt jobs program based on what’s really needed.
For example, when Defense Secretary Robert Gates announced Monday his plan to cut spending on military contractors by more than a quarter over three years, congressional leaders balked. Military contractors are major sources of jobs back in members’ states and districts. California’s Howard P. "Buck" McKeon, the top Republican on the House Armed Services Committee, demanded that the move "not weaken the nation’s defense." That’s congress-speak for "over my dead body."
Gates can’t even end useless weapons programs. That’s because they’re covert jobs programs that employ thousands.
He wants to stop production of the C-17 cargo jet he says is no longer needed. But it keeps 4,000 people working at Boeing’s Long Beach assembly plant and 30,000 others at Boeing suppliers strategically located in 40 states. So despite Gates’s protests the Senate has approved ten new orders.
That’s still not enough to keep all those C-17 workers employed, so the Pentagon and Boeing have been hunting for foreign purchasers. The Indian Air Force is now negotiating to buy ten, and talks are underway with several other nations, including Oman and Saudi Arabia.
Ever wonder why military equipment is one of America’s biggest exports? It’s our giant military jobs program in action...
The Pentagon’s budget -- and its giant undercover jobs program -- keeps expanding. The President has asked Congress to hike total defense spending next year 2.2 percent, to $708 billion. That’s 6.1 percent higher than peak defense spending during the Bush administration.
This sum doesn’t even include Homeland Security, Veterans Affairs, nuclear weapons management, and intelligence. Add these, and next year’s national security budget totals about $950 billion.
National security is a cover for job security.
This is nuts.
Wouldn’t it be better to have a jobs program that created things we really need — like light-rail trains, better school facilities, public parks, water and sewer systems, and non-carbon energy sources — than things we don’t, like obsolete weapons systems?
12 August 2010
The U.S. military as a "jobs program"
Selections from an essay by Robert Reich at Salon:
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
It's funny that USMC Major General Smedley Darlington Butler's 1933 speech, "War is a Racket", precedes the eponymous Eisenhower speech (and this article) and asserts very similar points... think perhaps he was onto something?
ReplyDeleteZ. Constantine - for reasons unknown to me, your comment showed up in my mailbox - but not at the post. Body of the comment reproduced here:
ReplyDeleteIt's funny that USMC Major General Smedley Darlington Butler's 1933 speech, "War is a Racket", precedes the eponymous Eisenhower speech (and this article) and asserts very similar points... think perhaps he was onto something?
...and yes, I do agree. I have his speech fulltext bookmarked for future blogging.
That military/industrial complex is beginning to look like the Ponzi scheme that was National Socialism.
ReplyDeleteBesides the waste of resources, there are the consequences arising from the inevitable use of the military in places like Vietnam and Iraq, necessary to justify the billions spent on preparing for war. Thousands of young lives sacrificed to "justify" such an idiotic "jobs program" is sickening!
ReplyDeleteWhat would it take to shift some of those resources to a different social program that's definitely in need of the man power - education? I love the idea of the National Guard coming to my school district to build and repair the dated facilities.
ReplyDeleteThe U.S. military is well equipped for most kinds of aid and construction. If we are going to continue to pay to train them, let's reap the rewards too.
This seems to be a recurring theme in American politics. Not just the military spending, but the protection of jobs and the inertia and market inefficiency this causes.
ReplyDeleteWe could shift the balance in favour of clean energy but that might cost coal jobs! We could change NASA's direction but that would cost existing shuttle jobs!
It seems pretty hypocritical and confused for Republicans to support such "socialist" practices (though it's inevitable).
PS Exporting weapons is particularly canny as it then justifies more domestic and foreign weapon sales!