Persuasive Essay On Defense Spending

As citizens of the United States of America we must pay taxes to the government. The government takes these taxes and distributes them among different areas to fund each are; one of the highest percentages of spending goes to defense. The whopping amount of around 610 billion dollars makes the United States’ military the largest in the world, so large that its funding out-weighs the next seven highest spending countries. The problem with this is that the military does not really solve the large amount of very important domestic affairs; in fact we barely see the fruits of it. There are many reasons why we should cut down on the percentage spent on defense and focus more on other areas.

With the numbers totaled the defense budget is currently sitting at a solid 3.5 percent of our GDP and there are still questions on how much more we can put in to make this country safe. The White House is calling for more money to be spent on national defense and their economists say that the United States can withstand a gross spending of somewhere around 9 to 10 percent of our GDP. The money to pay for any

Public opinion on the military budget has been divided for years. Surveys have previously shown a large number of Americans believing the nation spends too much on the military, others seem to be happy with the current levels of military spending and a small number saying they think the government spends too little. Now that spending has been cut, the public is more divided on the issue than it has been in decades. This makes the issue of military spending a particularly hot-button issue for the newly elected Republican

The United states national anthem, The Star-Spangled Banner, states: "Land of the free, home of the brave." This patriotic song adopted by the United States as our national anthem to express our nation's identity is no longer justified in relations with females being required to be drafted into the military. The word required emphasizes that this is not the "land of the free" because the United States is making it a requirement for citizens to be forced into the military out of their own free will. Furthermore, the anthem states "home of the brave", but people are not being brave when they are being forced. Bravery means having courage and being ready to face anything that comes your way, but if the military is making it a requirement to those

“The United States spent $598.5 billion dollars alone on the military in 2015. That is 54% of all spending in 2015. The US only spent $70 billion (6%) on education and $13.1 billion (1%) on food and agriculture.” (“Military Spending”). This shows what Americans really value.

In the past America has been a dominant superpower in the field of military strength, but for the last few decades, our military has encountered abounding liquidations and sequestrations, which lead to huge budget cuts. Nevertheless, America has faced many politicians planning to cut down on our military by virtue of it is simply cost effective. The Clinton Foundation has been cutting our military for countless years. Also, under the Obama Administration has been enacting laws comparable to the Budget Control Act or (BCA) which has been siphoning our military for the past 8 years. For countless years, defense officials remain silent due to the Obama Administration, vaguely America could keep its budget under control. Consequently, all four

The military was founded in 1775 in order to fight Great Britain. The small army was led by appointed commander George Washington. Ever since its establishment, the military has continued to increase. The United States currently has about 1.3 million active troops and an additional 865,000 troops in reserve - it is the world’s third largest military. The US also has a large global presence with troops deployed in over 170 countries including South Korea, Italy, Afghanistan, and Japan.

The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are winding down and that will help lower the defense spending by almost $1 trillion over the next decade. The congress is realizing that they need to do some restructuring and have already begun rearranging the military budget in response to austerity. Congress conjured up a $630 billion defense appropriations bill that made plans to reduce civilian and contractor personnel by 5 percent over the next five years and in return ramp up advanced weapons programs, including drones, bombers and missiles says The Washington Post. The American Conservative

The military is something that has been a bit costly for a while, the US according to a graph given by Peter G. Peterson spends an average of more than seven

I believe that the United States should not spend any more time, money, nor effort on the military than they already have done because they should be spending more time on repairing the amount of national debt they have instead of being the “police of the world.” They are already a step ahead in the game with the advanced military technology, but continue to neglect education and health care for the rest of the country, for examples the veterans who are homeless. They should cut the amount of money and amount of troops out there when they could be here and safe.

The United Stated government only spends about 5,2% of their GDP(global domestic product) for educational purposes, and in money, that is equivalent to $898.5 million out of the $17.97 trillion that they make. (CIA Factbook) Because of this shortage of funding, many schools, especially public schools in Chicago, are forced to work with less money, and don’t allow them to be able to create extracurricular programs for the students, make renovations in the school, or do other things of that nature. The total CPS budget is $5.69 billion, but they are facing a shortfall of one billion dollars.(Bradley) That is about 18% of CPS’ total budget that is being taken away from them. This shows how big a problem these cuts actually are and how much it affects the schools and the community. One of the areas of the country’s budget that could be spent less on is military. The United States’ total discretionary spending, which is the government spending implemented through an appropriations bill and are usually necessities, is around $1.11 trillion in 2015. The military expenditure 53.71% of the total discretionary spending, which is $598.49 billion, while the government only spends 6.28% on education, which is $69.98 billion.(nationalpriorities.org) That is a $528.51 billion difference! Does the United States actually have to spend that much on their military? The United States is the country that spends the most on its military, at about $1.56 trillion

With Trump’s election this year, his rhetoric of “Making America Great Again” and therefore revitalizing our military will soon become a reality. Trump has formally requested a reappropriation of funds; around $54 Billion, towards the US military. Part of Trump’s campaign promises had to do with making the military more robust; ensuring America’s title of militarily strongest in the world. In order to achieve this goal. Trump’s federal government has the option of many different aspects of the military to focus on. Of these, funding weapons of mass destruction, cyber security, and further military research and development prove themselves as most relevant in the contemporary military.

While this appears to be a good datapoint in that it is a direct correlation to “butter” related activities. Training is relative to education and compensation is relative to pay and benefits. A number of questions which arise: If 80% of the military budget is relative to “butter” related activities, and 20% is being spent for direct defense related efforts, then why are these costs included in the defense budget? Would shifting the costs for military training be better suited at the Department of Labor (current budget of $11.8 billion)? Would shifting the costs for compensation related healthcare be better situated at the Department of Health and Human Services (current budget s $77.1 billion) and the Department of Veterans Affairs (current budget s $65.3 billion)?

The Department of Defense (DOD) was recently approved a budget of $582.7 billion for 2017. $112.1 billion of this budget was specifically to “develop and procure equipment, technology, and capabilities…” [1].