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When President Obama announced last night that his surge of 30,000 more troops in Afghanistan would cost $30 billion, I wondered what that would mean if we had to actually pay that amount. I know that the cost of this military escalation will simply be tacked on to the national debt. With that said, I was curious what it would cost if we were paying for this surge right now.
In 2006, 99,880,223 people paid Federal income taxes for the year of 2005. This is the most recent information that I could find, so I will use this number. Not that it really matters. Using these numbers, that means if we wanted to pay for Obama’s surge with an across the board, flat-tax, every taxpayer would need to cough up an extra $300.36 when they file their taxes.
I wonder how many Americans, Republicans or Democrats, would be willing to support Obama and his Afghanistan surge if we were actually paying for it?
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Lee B.
/ December 2, 2009I agree with your perspective on dollars spent on a country the rest of the world seems to not give a rat’s ass about. But I also lament about the hundreds of American lives that will be lost over there for something that may end up being pointless at the end of it. Sigh.
Rick
/ December 3, 2009@Lee B.: People don’t care so much about the lives because they’ve been told over and over again that everyone in a military is a volunteer. It’s a choice. Never mind that many in today’s all volunteer force are in the military for economic reasons.
I just wonder if we had to actually pay for our wars, would we be so willing to wage them? I’m guessing we wouldn’t.