4 ms·

How come military oriented job programs are the only ones that seem to pass the Grim-Reaper of Free-Market zealotry?

deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
Spooky23 6y ago
Free markets are just something you say. The voters who claim to care think the free market are coupons at the supermarket or something anyway. The political contributions of the sheet metal shop in your district that stamps some widget for the F-35 at 50x market price definitely matter.
momokoko 6y ago
Because based upon WTO agreements and others, the US cannot force all contractors and suppliers to hire only or mostly within the US. The one exception is “national security”. So military spending is the most efficient to create jobs in the US because you can prevent hiring in other countries. An example in the opposite direction is US subsidies for solar energy. These subsidies do create some jobs installing them, but the majority of jobs end up created overseas in other countries like China.
- arethuza 6y ago
  Interesting, one of the areas that the UK government and the EU are apparently arguing over is our apparently quite right wing government wants more freedom to support UK companies through state aid than the 'socialist' EU would like. If we were to be constrained by WTO rules (an organisation hardcore Leavers seem very fond of) perhaps we can expect an increase in UK arms spending, though this being the UK no doubt this won't mean any improvements for the people at the sharp end of things.
  - pbhjpbhj 6y ago
    Government procurement is interesting, eh. We've recently spent something like £1Billion on masks - hundreds of millions to companies which seem all to have connections to Tory faithful ... and AFAICT none of which have provided useable masks. (Aside from corruption why would they pay if the product isn't useable??!). I dare say defence procurement will be similar. Here's to cutting all that contracting red-tape the EU had us wade through. /s
zeveb 6y ago
Because a military is one of the few things that the United States government has the constitutional authority to do (the list is extremely limited: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Article_One_of_the_United_States_Constitution#Section_8:_Powers_of_Congress https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Article_One_of_the_United_Stat...).
- tgflynn 6y ago
  > ... to pay the Debts and provide for the common defence and general Welfare of the United States Right after "common defence" comes "general warfare" but for some reason that's something most Americans (or at least their politicians) seem to prefer to ignore.
  - svieira 6y ago
    Most Americans agree that "the welfare of others" ought to be cared for, they just disagree who ought to be primarily responsible for the care. With too broad an understanding of "general welfare" you'd wind up with a 10th amendment that means nothing, because "the general welfare" includes everything, so the Federal government is the only government. I would hate to make Federal lawmakers spend brainpower making laws regarding snow removal that worked equally well in LA and AK.
    - tgflynn 6y ago
      Yes, unfortunately as long as you have humans making laws they'll be full of contradictions and unintended consequences.
  - zeveb 6y ago
    The 'common defence and welfare' provide the reasons for taxation, and are enumerated in the following items. Note that James Madison — who wrote much of the Constitution — vetoed a federal works bill because he found it unconstitutional. The Wikipedia article at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taxing_and_Spending_Clause#General_Welfare_Clause https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taxing_and_Spending_Clause#Gen... is pretty good. I think it's pretty obvious that the narrow view is the only defensible one.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

Free markets are just something you say. The voters who claim to care think the free market are coupons at the supermarket or something anyway. The political contributions of the sheet metal shop in your district that stamps some widget for the F-35 at 50x market price definitely matter.

momokoko 6y ago

Because based upon WTO agreements and others, the US cannot force all contractors and suppliers to hire only or mostly within the US. The one exception is “national security”. So military spending is the most efficient to create jobs in the US because you can prevent hiring in other countries. An example in the opposite direction is US subsidies for solar energy. These subsidies do create some jobs installing them, but the majority of jobs end up created overseas in other countries like China.

arethuza 6y ago
Interesting, one of the areas that the UK government and the EU are apparently arguing over is our apparently quite right wing government wants more freedom to support UK companies through state aid than the 'socialist' EU would like. If we were to be constrained by WTO rules (an organisation hardcore Leavers seem very fond of) perhaps we can expect an increase in UK arms spending, though this being the UK no doubt this won't mean any improvements for the people at the sharp end of things.
- pbhjpbhj 6y ago
  Government procurement is interesting, eh. We've recently spent something like £1Billion on masks - hundreds of millions to companies which seem all to have connections to Tory faithful ... and AFAICT none of which have provided useable masks. (Aside from corruption why would they pay if the product isn't useable??!). I dare say defence procurement will be similar. Here's to cutting all that contracting red-tape the EU had us wade through. /s

zeveb 6y ago

Because a military is one of the few things that the United States government has the constitutional authority to do (the list is extremely limited: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Article_One_of_the_United_States_Constitution#Section_8:_Powers_of_Congress https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Article_One_of_the_United_Stat...).

tgflynn 6y ago
> ... to pay the Debts and provide for the common defence and general Welfare of the United States Right after "common defence" comes "general warfare" but for some reason that's something most Americans (or at least their politicians) seem to prefer to ignore.
- svieira 6y ago
  Most Americans agree that "the welfare of others" ought to be cared for, they just disagree who ought to be primarily responsible for the care. With too broad an understanding of "general welfare" you'd wind up with a 10th amendment that means nothing, because "the general welfare" includes everything, so the Federal government is the only government. I would hate to make Federal lawmakers spend brainpower making laws regarding snow removal that worked equally well in LA and AK.
  - tgflynn 6y ago
    Yes, unfortunately as long as you have humans making laws they'll be full of contradictions and unintended consequences.
- zeveb 6y ago
  The 'common defence and welfare' provide the reasons for taxation, and are enumerated in the following items. Note that James Madison — who wrote much of the Constitution — vetoed a federal works bill because he found it unconstitutional. The Wikipedia article at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taxing_and_Spending_Clause#General_Welfare_Clause https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taxing_and_Spending_Clause#Gen... is pretty good. I think it's pretty obvious that the narrow view is the only defensible one.