| >After years of swelling deficits fed by incessant warfare in distant lands, in 2020, as long expected, the U.S. dollar finally loses its special status as the world's reserve currency. Suddenly, the cost of imports soars. Unable to pay for swelling deficits by selling now-devalued Treasury notes abroad, Washington is finally forced to slash its bloated military budget. It's funny and interesting that the military budget is such a common punching bag. The defense budget is a pretty small percentage of the overall outlays. Yet people continue to act like it's the single line item that is holding America back. Here's where the American federal government spent money in 2020. * $1T on unemployment compensation and paycheck protection program * $1.1T on social security * $1.2T on medicare and medicaid * $1T on "other" which includes federal employee retirements and welfare programs * $900B on non-defense discretionary spending on thing such as housing assistance, transportation, and education. ...and then, finally, we get to defense spending at $700B. The budget deficit for FY2020 was $3.1T. Maybe the military budget is so high it is causing a ripple in the multiverse that makes arithmetic different in this universe. Maybe if we cut $300B from the military budget in our universe it will even out to $3T because magic. |
In typical years the Defense spending is equal to each of the discretionary non-defense spending and "other" mandatory spending which excludes Medicare + Medicaid and Social Security. Medicare + Medicaid and Social Security spending have certainly increased the most and that seems to be inline with the increased spending on health care over the last few decades.
It's also worth noting that the non-defense categories still include defense related spending like veterans' income security, benefits, and services.