There are some other calculations in the same study . . . . If we had spent that $60 billion on clean energy, we would have created (directly or indirectly) 330,000 more jobs. If we'd spent it on healthcare, we'd have created 480,000 more jobs. And if we'd spent it on education, we'd have created 1.05 million more jobs. . . .
Let's say we want to create 29 million jobs in 10 years. That's 2.9 million each year. Here's one way to do it. Take $100 billion from the Department of Defense and move it into education. That creates 1.75 million jobs per year. Take another $50 billion and move it into healthcare spending. There's an additional 400,000 jobs. Take another $100 billion and move it into clean energy. There's another 550,000 jobs. And take another $62 billion and turn it into tax cuts, generating an additional 200,000 jobs. Now the military spending in the Department of Energy, the State Department, Homeland Security, and so forth have not been touched. And the Department of Defense has been cut back to about $388 billion, which is to say: more than it was getting 10 years ago when our country went collectively insane.
Labor and resources are sitting idle while the bogeyman of "deficits" deprives the population of the goods and services they could create. Diverting a portion of our massive war spending to peaceful use could add jobs, improve living standards, and add infrastructure, while reducing the national debt and balancing the government's budget by increasing the tax base and government revenues.
Prepared for "The Military Industrial Complex at 50" , a conference in Charlottesville, VA, September 16-18, 2011.
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