How many people have your tax dollars killed?

176,000 people have died from the war in Afghanistan over the course of 20 years, and the United States spent roughly $2.3 trillion. This is one of many wars or proxy wars that the US has been a part of. There's a list of conflicts that the US is a part of on this Wikipedia page. To figure out how much of your tax dollars go into the military, we need to look at the US defense budget.

The US defense budget is around $800 billion, but at the time of writing this according to usaspending.gov, the money actually available amounts to $1.8 trillion. This isn't necessarily what's spent, however the treasury states that the DoD has an obligation to spend $1.2 trillion.

This money gets allocated to a few different sections. The US Department of the Treasury tries to break it down into subsections, for example the Navy, the Air Force etc, but that doesn't really explain who makes money from it.

When allocating funds to a branch of the military, a large portion of the money gets spent on private defense contractors. Two of the largest defense contractors are Lockheed Martin with $65 billion in revenue in 2022, and Raytheon with $67.1 billion. The defense contractors have to pay employee salaries, investors, and leadership. The CEO of Lockheed Martin for example made $24 million in 2022. More information on the quantity of contractors and budgets can be found here. Those numbers are a far cry from the $1.2 trillion obligation but there are many more contractors on the list not to mention operations and other costs.

These companies solely exist because of government contracts and because of continued war. They make more and more money because there is an endless manufactured war. Politicians and people invested in these companies continue to do anything it takes to ensure that war continues. Because 90% of these companies income is selling weapons to the government, it is in their best interest that there is always war. The Military-Industrial Complex has been described by former President Eisenhower, I won't go into too much detail about it here, but you can read Eisenhower's Farewell address.

All this money gets funded by taxpayers which rapidly gets funneled towards war. This causes pain and suffering  not just those in the military but anyone in its proximity. It uses people as pawns and drives hate between countries. Do people from Russia really hate Ukranians? Do Americans really hate the Russian people? In my opinion, sort of, but only because that's what they're taught to do. Americans hate the Russians because they want to nuke us, Russians hate Americans because they bully the rest of the world and create sanctions. But the general populace shouldn't hate each other. It's the governments and the war machine driving hate and conflict to keep money being funneled in. I can't speak for everyone, but I imagine people would much prefer peacetime and would rather engage in new vibrant cultures around the world. Spend the time to learn about Russian culture, while they learn about American. I use these two countries as an example as it is the latest ongoing conflict, but this has been going on for many decades and between many more nations. One conflict ends, and the next one starts.

People will always continue to strive for money and power, but what can change is where that money is allocated. Why not use the money for good? In Europe since the year 2000, there has been $843 billion dollars invested into the infrastructure, which remains underfunded. Roadway infrastructure in the trillions. When talking about railway infrastructure in the US, one might say: "what infrastructure?". Europe has 3.93 million square miles and the US 3.797 million square miles. Imagine how great our rail infrastructure could be if money were invested solely into rail, let alone so many other sectors. It could be subsidized, and huge cuts taken out even to satiate the greed of those who currently push for war.

It doesn't have to be limited to rail, it can be expanded to so many industries which could instead benefit the public. The people would be happier, more willing to pay their taxes and the economy would be better. A better economy would also mean more taxes to pay in the long term, and best of all, no suffering or using people to further an agenda.

But what would happen to the defense contractor companies, wouldn't they go bankrupt? They would fight tooth and nail to stay in business. These companies have a lot of money, which means that they have the capability and resources to pivot. Raytheon is very good at inventing and manufacturing technology, why can't they do the same thing but for the public sector and to benefit people? Why can't research be spent into public transit, or health care or something to benefit others instead? Maybe one day we could learn to love what Raytheon or Lockheed Martin has to offer, even if the executives and government officials continue to be greedy and lust for power. The politicians would still be able to get power, as people would like them more and appreciate what they have accomplished, instead of loathing the fact that they strive for money power and war.

Unfortunately the world isn't perfect and it is much more complicated than this. For example to invest in rail, airline companies would lose profits, would they need to be subsidized too? This begs the same question though, why can't they pivot into being "transportation" companies? American Airlines already started using busses for some really short routes instead of flying in some scenarios. Another example would be using rail to transport oil. I forget where I saw this and so it may not be fully accurate, but the keystone pipeline was cancelled because of lobbying from rail companies which were used to transport oil. Warren Buffet had invested in many of these and the pipeline being much more efficient would cause the trains to become obsolete and losing him money. So why didn't he invest in the pipeline? Why not convert those railway routes into passenger routes?

I think the answer is that war is simple. Figuring out all these other solutions and what the general population wants is hard work, but staying alive is an easy decision. Why not manufacture a problem where the only solution is to stay alive at any cost? Additionally with war, there's a sense of urgency which means spending has much less scrutiny and emergency spending can bypass many regulations. Overspending is easy to be done when a road needs to be built as soon as possible at any cost, and therefore the spenders get extorted for those costs.