re: #249 Slumbering Behemoth

Besides, what percentage or our GDP is being spent on military? It seems a bit skewed to claim that the U.S. spends more than everyone else in the entire world combined without putting it into context of GDP, costs of advanced tech, and so on.

Hell, American citizens likely spend more of their own personal income on cocaine, beer, music, whatever, than the all of the other world citizens combined. But what does a statement like that really mean?

First off, we do spend a higher percentage of GDP than most other countries. But merely having a high GDP doesn’t necessitate larger military spending. So what if our GDP is high? In absolute terms we seem to overspend—6 times as much as our nearest frenemy, China. Maybe, just maybe we could manage to keep ourselves safe for “only” $600B a year?

As for coke, beer and music, it’s extremely unlikely that we spend more than the rest of the world combined. The rest of the world likes those things about as much as we do; they like military spending less.