A Case For Cutting The U.S. Defense Budget

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With all the talk about deficts and government spending run amok, since the Republicans lost total power in 2006, it seems odd that the defense budget is bigger than ever. It's not just the wars, since these operations are figured differently than regular defense spending, probably because the government doesn't really want the American people to know about how much it wastes on two of its favorite hobbies: Awarding government contracts [mostly no bid contracts], and its adventuring that keeps all of us "safe" from whom only God knows -- and He's probably the only one who can figure that out these days. An interesting take on all this defense spending was posted on Cato several months ago. First, here's a pretty niffty breakdown of what is expected regarding the "defense of the nation:"

This seems overly ambitious to me, especially at a time when we are stealing money from our teachers, schools and children, under the false claims that we are "bankrupt" because of government spending on such "frivolous" items as our children's future. Well, let's not get too carried away.

Nevertheless, we don't hear much about the big money and what is supposedly spent on the "common defense." That propagandist term certainly has a nice, self-righteous ring to it until one discovers that is really the "ring" of cash registers going off all over Defense Contractor Land.

Note that this never really changes much, whether the prez is a "good ole' redneck boy" from Crawford, Texas, or a "Kenyan-born Marxist," who "hates" America enough to become its prez, so it does no good to point fingers in this instance.

Imagine a defense budget based on reality, rather than mindless propaganda. Some things just defy imagination.

That defies both reality AND imagination. And that appears to be exactly where we are stuck at the moment, supporting a military and foreign policy that has no test in results, or exit strategies, or even "winning," as standards or objectives

The idea of cutting the militray just seems so "unAmerican." Shouldn't entitlements go first? I, for one, don't think so.

Nor would we need to sacrifice the future of our children either.

http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=12582

 

Try winning an election in US on promises to cut military spending, on making the US "weaker". Probably less succesful than trying to humanize and rationalise the treatment of petty criminals and maybe not just stuff everyone into prison for years and years.

 

I agree that for the sake of fiscal responsibility cutbacks in the military are necessary. However, the one thing that the anti-military crowd always forgets (or do not know at all) is that the military is the largest welfare/unemployment program that the US government supports. In addition money spent on military research leads to many inventions that we in civilian life enjoy.

 

Did you know that we pay "private contractors" 3 to 4 times MORE than the average soldier? So much for enlisting because it is the right thing to do for your country. Imagine how it must feel to be a soldier fighting along side a contractor [mercenary] in Afghanistan who is making far more than you, just because you did the partriotic and right thing, and they did it because the government "choses" to pay them more. They are doing this to avoid a draft, which would not only be far cheaper, but because if they had a draft, people would question the whole thing much more than they do now.

That's fair enough, Snook, since I see you as part of the "anti children/education" crowd."

 

1. That may be true, but I'm also pretty sure that most of these"private contractors" are ex-military.

2. I don't think that is fair or accurate.

 

Chandos, the private contractors recruit from the active military. My nephew has been approached several times now that he has less than a year left (and three tours in Iraq and Afganistan). Most of the guys on the ground really have no problem with the contractors knowing they (the contractors) are prior service and "paid their dues."

And a draft would not be cheaper. The draft brings in its own host of problems and expenses -- the most prevalent is a lack of committment by the draftees and the subsequent lowering of efficiency which requires more bodies (and body bags).

 

I would really like to see where they get that number from - broken down to a little more detail than what is provided in the link. I work as a contractor for the Department of Defense. My program is the third largest in the department, and the largest of the non-war programs. Our cost of running the program for the year are a little over $1 billion. If we're the biggest non-war program, where's the other $549 billion going?

 

So what is the main issue that you are concerned with, Chandos? That we spend $500+ billion on non-war related things in the defense budget? Mercenaries fighting our wars? Government contractors in general? You've hit on a wide array of contractors in this post, and just because you work for the government as a contractor, doesn't make you a bad person, or means you working for a poor cause. NOG works for a company contracted out by NASA. I work for a company contracted out by the DoD for chemical weapons destruction. I'd like to think NOG and I aren't part of the problem, but it almost seems like you're saying that all contractors are created equally (worthless?).

Most of the time, the government hires contractors when they lack the expertise in doing it themselves. Their options are to hire a whole bunch of experts, or hire a company that already has said experts.

 

Which company? That makes a difference. Some contractors only exist because of the taxpayer, while the government is just one client among many for some businesses that don't need the taxpayer to support them.

Aldeth - This is really mostly about the defense budget, not contracting in general. I was specfically addressing defense, or what is supposedly spending for "defense." Note that Stanger makes the point that contracting is the way of the future and that in many instances it makes sense, more the result of globalization than just plain greed.

The problem is accountability, regarding what is public service and what is for profit. Some now seem to be saying that even enlisting in the service is kind of "on-the-job training," for moving on to a high-paying profession once you get your chops down. It used to be that it was partiotic service to your country to join the military. Now it seems to be just business. While it's nice that there is an intersection between public service and personal interest, where does one leave off and the other begin?

Again this is really mostly about the defense budget, not contracting

 

I don't know. My company is for profit, but the government is not our only client. (Well, locally, it's our only client, but I work for a fortune 500 company, and so we do stuff in a lot of places around the world.)

I'm not sure if you were asking this rhetorically. Is it not self evident based on the company involved? My company is in the business of making money, and we are most decidedly for profit. The fact that we're providing a public service while doing so is an ancillary point. We also make money doing stuff that isn't in any way a public service.

That's definitely true. I'd say about 1/3 of our company's local workforce are retired military. The normal routine is work for the military for 20 years so you have guaranteed health care coverage and a pension for life, and then flip over to the contracting side, get a bigger salary, and still keep all the perks from being in the military for 20 years.

And really, how can you blame them for doing so? They gave their country 20 years... That's about as patriotic as you can get. Now they're making a decision based on their own financial self-interest - but it doesn't change the fact that they put their time in and served. I know these people. I work with them. In general, these are good people Chandos.

 

No, it's not rhetorical at all. Look at Stanger's point in the clip. If you have private companies executing foreign policy [public policy] and they decide it conflicts with their goals, what's to stop them from crafting their own policies, that they may find more "agreeable," instead? You may have companies executing policy that may not have the public interest in mind, even though the public is paying and counting on them. For any company the bottom line is, well, the bottom line as you correctly point out. In other words, who is holding whom accountable for conflicts of interest?

Yes, but serving their country may have been a means to a personal end. Not that that is bad thing, but that's hardly "patriotic." That's like those preachers who rake in tons of cash -- yeah, they are spreading "The Message" while they are taking your credit card number over the phone. I'm reminded of the volunteers at Valley Forge, and were forgotten after the Revolution was over. It wasn't fair, but THEY were as "Patriotic as you can get."

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There are always good and bad people in this kind of situation. But I'm not quite sure why you are telling me this. Unless you think it is OK that they make 3 or 4 times what an average soldier makes, while we cut the pay of teachers who make far less, and make further cuts to educate our children. That was my point. I didn't bring up why Blackwater had to change its name, or why it was run out of Iraq.

 

Well, without knowing specifically which company you are talking about, I cannot answer that. Heck, even if I did know the company, I cannot tell you where their interests lie in every conceivable sitution. I can, however, tell you why I feel accountable, why my company feels accountable, and why it's in our best interests to keep the government's interests in mind. You probably won't like the answer, but it is for the most pragmatic of reasons: The next job. Simply put, contracts have expiration dates, the US government is a very good customer (we've never been stiffed by them), and if you don't do your job the way they want you to do it, they will take their dollars elsewhere when your contract is up.

Many of the people I referred to enlisted in the Army when they were 18, and later went to college on the GI Bill. Others went right into college in the ROTC program. Still others went to college, and then went to Officer's Candidate School afterwards. The point is, these people were 18-22 years old when they signed up. It is, IMO, absurd to think that kids, about 20 years old, were thinking about a payoff 20 years down the line. That absurdity is compounded by the fact that 20 years ago, at the time they were enlisting, such government contracts didn't even exist, and no one would have predicted 20 years ago that it would be like this today.

I'm not saying that people do not use the military as a means to an end. Hell, a good chunk of them used the military to get a college education. But to suggest that they deliberately entered the military so they could get some fat contractor salary 20 years later, when such contracts did not even yet exist, defies belief. I'm willing to concede they took an opportunity when they saw it, but I don't think they entered the military with that end goal in mind. I'm not going to disparage someone's decision to take a job that makes financial sense for them and their families, especially not after having given their nation 20 years of service.

Well, now that you do bring it up, I will run with it. Blackwater contractors may very well make 3 to 4 times what the average soldier makes. But that's not to say that all government contractors working on the Defense Department's dime are making 3 to 4 times what a comparable person on the government side is making. In fact, I'm sure they aren't. I know what I, and people in similar positions make as an annual salary. If it were true that most contractors were making 3 to 4 times what comparable military personnel were making, one of two things would be true:

1. I and everyone else in my company are being grossly underpaid or
2. Most government personnel in comparable positions are living below the poverty line.

That larger point is the Department of Defense (or the DoD as it is usually referred to) employs tens of thousands of people. And not all of those defense dollars go to the type of sadistic vigilantes employed by Blackwater, or to line the pockets of the top execs of Haliburton. Most of those dollars go to people like me and my co-workers, who put in a honest day's work for an honest day's wage. We aren't raking in money hand over fist, we aren't sitting in meeting rooms trying to figure out how we can pry every last dollar out of the government's hand, and we certainly aren't earning salaries that would place us in the top tax brackets.

I'm sure I, and most of the people I work with, make more than the average American citizen. I'm sure our top managers make very good salaries indeed. But it's not like the average workers are pulling in six figure salaries. That's the reason why I'm asserting that most civilian contractors don't make 3 to 4 times what their military counterparts make. And if you take a look at some of the contracts in the DoD's budget, I think you'll find that many of them are programs that have some merit - including the one I work on.

EDIT: Which is to say that perhaps a good chunk of that $550 billion is money well spent.

 

That's certainly true, but it is not absurd to believe that they have opened the door to more recent people joining for 2-4 years and THEN turning around and becoming mercenaries. Again, this thread was not an attack on people like you, Aldeth, who do valuable work for the government. It is about "cutting" defense spending.

When one looks at the current spending and debt of all levels of government, one of two things or both are clear: We either stop spending, or raise taxes. Good luck with raising taxes, espeically on the rich, where most of the wealth is concentrated. And Obama just extended ALL the Bush tax cuts and lowered taxes AGAIN [the SS tax]. Believe me. I'm all for you keeping your job, Aldeth [and paying you well for it], and I know you do fine work, judging by years spent on these boards. Please don't think this is personal.

Oh, I know that. I'm not one of those Tea Party dudes who thinks government employees get a "free ride." I was very specfic about mercenaries ["cotractors" is the politically correct term these days]. We don't want to appear like England's King George III, I guess.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercenary

 

It could, but my point was that's not where all those dollars are going - or even most of them if my sheet on program spending in the DoD is close to accurate.

I know it's not a personal attack, and I'm trying not to take in personally. The thing is, it potentially affects me personally. Let's just say I don't have a great deal of confidence that if they cut defense spending they'd take it away from the goons at Blackwater, and instead not take it away from my company. That could prove disastrous for my continued employment, so there is a portion of this that will be personal for me. Like I said, I know it's not an attack by you on me, but at the same time, I cannot completely disconnect myself emotionally from this issue.

I think another thing to look at is why the government spends so much money on contractors in the first place. I think it has a lot to do with how the government employs people to begin with. It is true that on a sheer dollar basis, it costs the government more money to employ a contractor for a year, than to hire a person to do the job for a year.

But that's not the calculation. Once the government hires someone, it's almost impossible to get rid of them. Even if the job they were originally hired to do is now over. They get placed in some other program, usually in some area which is not their specific area of expertise, and keep their salaries. So in the long run, it is cheaper to hire a contractor, pay them for the length of the job (say 3-5 years), and they say goodbye when the job is over, than hire a guy directly, and have to pay him for the next 20 years when you only needed him for 3-5 years. Would you rather pay a guy $80K for five years, or $60K for 20 years, when you only really need him for five years? (That's not the situation with Blackwater, but I believe this symptom is indicative of why there are so many private contractors working for the government to begin with.)

That said, if I got offered a government job doing what I do now, even if I got paid about 10% less than I do now, I'd take it in a heartbeat. I'd have that job for as long as I'd want that job. So I guess I'm as pragmatic as everyone else. But that should tell you something. I work on the private side, and I'd rather be on the other side.

 

Don't count on "defense" being cut in a meaningful way. The fat cats who benefit from it will have the final say.

Aldeth - I wouldn't worry [And I sincerely hope you keep your job]. But if your wife is a teacher, I am worried for her. I hear the hammer is getting ready to fall on a lot of teachers in Texas. That is bad news, since there is really no way to make up the huge deficit that Texas is running, atm. I hope things are better in your state.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/41993528/ns/politics-more_politics/

 

My program is fully funded through the end of the year, so I should be good in 2011 at the least.

My wife is a teacher, although she hasn't taught much since the birth of our son. While there haven't been any teachers laid off in MD, there have been some cost cutting measures implemented. First of all, no teachers received raises this school year. And in some school districts, where there were a bunch of teachers still teaching past the retirement age, they basically forced them into retirement, hiring younger teachers to replace them who would be paid less.