The cost of war, the politics of “freedom”

War costs lives, the highest price of all
I’ve written articles on the cost of war, particularly with respect to lost lives, broken families, and many casualties endured by Americans throughout the country.  I never forget the difficult years that have been forced on our families and children because of this war.  People will never forget the pain that comes with war for as long as they live, no matter how cold their hearts may be. 

War causes pain, instability in our families and government
Another point I’ve repeatedly argued is that we are now faced with a future without our loved ones.  We must find ways to press on despite their deaths and those of thousands of American citizens.  As difficult as it is at times, however, we need to step away from the emotional aspect of War policy and get down to another harsh reality of war.  Relatively speaking, the two are incomparable, but just the same the costs are sky high and will tax our market, economy and policies for the unforeseeable future even if the Iraq war were to end today.

The color of money: ABC news story on the trillion dollar war, Iraq

An ABC News story a few months ago suggested that the war can reach anywhere from $700 billion to $2 trillion dollars.  Below is an excerpt from the article, you might be interested in these numbers, especially if you tend to throw numbers around whenever you discuss government sponsored social programs.

The price of war: $700 billion to $2 trillion estimate by Nobel Prize winner Joseph Stiglitz (economics) who tries to put the price of war in perspective

The price tag for the Iraq War is now estimated at $700 billion in direct costs and perhaps twice that much when indirect expenditures are included. Cost estimates vary — Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz puts the total cost at more than $2 trillion — but let’s be conservative and say it’s only $1 trillion (in today’s dollars).

As a number of other commentators have recently written, this number — a 1 followed by 12 zeroes — can be put into perspective in various ways. Given how large the war looms, it doesn’t hurt to repeat this simple exercise with other examples and in other ways.

Different Monetary Units

There are many comparisons that might be made, and devising new governmental monetary units is one way to make them. Consider, for example, that the value of one EPA, the annual budget of the Environmental Protection Agency, is about $7.5 billion. The cost of the Iraq War is thus more than a century’s worth of EPA spending (in today’s dollars), almost 130 EPAs, only a small handful of which would probably have been sufficient to clean up Superfund sites around the country.

Or note that the annual budget for the Department of Education is about $55 billion, which puts the price tag for Iraq at about 18 EDs. Just a few of these EDs would certainly have put muscle into the slogan “No child left behind.”

And since the annual budgets of the National Science Foundation and the National Cancer Institute are $6 billion and $5 billion, respectively, the $1 trillion war cost is equivalent to 170 NSFs and 200 NCIs. No doubt a couple of those NSFs could have been used to develop cheap hybrid cars and alternative fuels. Scientific progress is by its nature unpredictable, but some extra NCIs might also have lead to breakthroughs in cancer treatment.

Fred Soto is an Attorney and Entrepreneur from the Silicon Valley.
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