Government Priorities

Just read a great post at Yglesias’ blog about federal domestic spending vs. defense spending and the effects on economic growth. Two points here:

First, he’s not the only one who thinks over zealous defense spending hastens a decline in American hegemonic influence. I took a class in graduate school and we talked specifically about this particular topic. Read America’s Half Century if you’re interested in the scholarly details.

Second, I was discussing this issue with a Pakistani friend of mine. The point is simple: if you spend a dollar on a gun, the only way you’ll make money on that dollar is to use the gun to take resources from somewhere*. If you spend a dollar on education or some kind of infrastructure project (like high speed internet access), then its easy to imagine a way to make money from that dollar. Therefore, if we are concerned about our economic growth we need to minimize dollars spent on guns and maximize those spent on education or infrastructure.

*That is assuming, of course, the gun isn’t being used to protect our ability to make money with the previous dollar. But you all knew what I meant.