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> Taxes are there to raise armies, not money. Perhaps that baseless assertion rings true in the US, where the dominant anti-state and anti-social policy politi
by arinlen 4y ago
> Taxes are there to raise armies, not money.
Perhaps that baseless assertion rings true in the US, where the dominant anti-state and anti-social policy political views create a vicious cycle of sabotaging public services followed by arguing public services should not be provided because they are badly managed.
In Europe, whose countries have been criticized by US politicians for spending under 2% of the national budget in their armed forces, money tends to be mainly spent on healthcare and social programs.
- harambae 4y ago> In Europe, whose countries have been criticized by US politicians for spending under 2% of the national budget in their armed forces The criticism (whether I agree with it or not) is that Europeans largely live under the umbrella of US protection. The US contributed $73 billion to NATO in 2020 compared to Lithuania's $1 billion [0]. Who is more likely to drag the other one into a conflict with Russia? [0] https://www.visualcapitalist.com/this-is-how-much-nato-countries-spend-on-defense/ https://www.visualcapitalist.com/this-is-how-much-nato-count...
- arinlen 4y ago> The criticism (whether I agree with it or not) is that Europeans largely live under the umbrella of US protection. That was Trump's inflammatory and subjective accusation, but the only objective criticism was that most counties in NATO did not met the 2% GDP target for expenditure on their armed forces. The US reportedly spends 3.5% of its GDP on their armed forces. https://www.statista.com/statistics/266892/military-expenditure-as-percentage-of-gdp-in-highest-spending-countries/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/266892/military-expendit... Consequently, it's easy to see that OP's baseless assertion that "Taxes are there to raise armies, not money" is patently false, even when considering the world's leaders in military expenditure. > The US contributed $73 billion to NATO in 2020 compared to Lithuania's $1 billion [0]. Completely irrelevant. The US, the world's richest nation by far, has a population of around 329 million and it's GDP is around $21T. Lithuania's population is around 1% of the US population (2.1 million, similar to New Mexico). Moreover, Lithuania is a pretty bad example regarding NATO's expenditure target, as it's military spending exceeds NATO's target (around 2.12% of its GDP). GDP-wise, Russia is a kin to Italy, and the European Union's GDP is slightly lower than the US', at around $18T.
- neilwilson 4y agoIf you want a War on Poverty, you need an army to fight it. It appears that allegory is a lost art in certain sections of the New World. It's about manpower, not money