To get a sense of how big the proposed budget increase would be, consider a few facts. Adjusting for inflation, this would be the largest year-to-year increase in the defense budget since the Korean War.
dtic.mil
Funny how the DOD budget in 1950 equated to 4.3% of total US GDP, and now equates to less than 3%, the lowest since before WWII.
The total Federal budget as a percentage of GDP was 15% in 1950, whereas in 1996 it was 20.8%, with DOD being budgeted at 3.4% of GDP.
As a percentage of the total Federal budget, DOD expenditures have also hit a post WWII low, amounting to 27% of the total Federal budget in 1950, but only 16% in 1995.
It also understates the fact that the largest portion of the DOD budget consists of salaries and benefits, not weaponry... One of the by-products of an all volunteer military.
Bush's 2003 budget apparently calls for $369 Billion for DOD, amounting to 3.6% of GDP.
Figures often beguile me, particularly when I have the arranging of them myself; in which case the remark attributed to Disraeli would often apply with justice and force: "There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies and statistics."
- Autobiography of Mark Twain
Hawk@tomsawyer.com |
