The Arms Industry: Robbing the Working Class of a Better Life

This is a podcast about ending U.S. poverty.

And that makes a lot of us most interested.

separate from the fact that war instituted by the united states is killing people it's maiming people it's destroying communities and families but it's also leading to huge lost opportunities here and you've done some terrific reporting most recently i think in april in your newsletter about the 1.5 trillion dollars that we're spending for the pentagon and what it could fund instead so Can you walk us through a little bit about what your research was and how you conducted that research and what you found about the lost opportunities here?

Well, it's really, there's an antiquated debate, I think, about big versus small government.

And in practice, that debate is basically over.

It's not big versus small government or limited versus expansive government.

It's really who government works for.

And that's what this trade-off discussion is all about.

When you talk about a $1.5 trillion military budget, which compared, it's not just, I mean, the point of comparison isn't largest versus Vietnam War or post-Cold War high.

We're talking a military budget that's higher than World War II adjusted for inflation.

In real dollars, not just a little bit more, but 20% more than World War II's peak.

So Trump wants to spend over 200 billion more in 2027 on the military than the US spent in 1945. which is shocking.

It really

is.

Yeah.

So I went through and I mean, charts are kind of my MO.

So now I kind of, I've chosen a theme and now I'm stuck with it.

So for this one, it actually worked out really well because it was kind of how I pictured it in my head is that you have one column showing a $1.5 trillion budget.

And on the other, you have all the stuff that it could fund instead.

And I thought it would be...

Friend, the thing is, when I talk about military spending, it's a grim subject.

It really is.

I mean, thinking about what it does and all that stuff.

When you talk about trade-off, that's when it's fun because you can imagine what the government can do instead.

You can think about all of the Just a wholesale rejection, basically, of free market logics when it comes to military spending.