[phil21]

Far from above scrutiny, the military budget has been the go-to talking point and area for real actual cuts my entire adult life. While it's share of the national budget has gone down, spending has only increased in other areas to more than compensate for it. I can't really say the increased spending on social services has resulted in great gains for societal health, education outcomes, or really anything.

Not everything can be explained by budget percentages, but on the face of it redirecting military spending to other areas has not resulted in many large wins for society as a whole so far.

It likely didn't have to be this way, but we apparently are really bad at deploying tax dollars into socially meaningful infrastructure. That and there are larger factors at play.

[collingreen]

It's been talked about (because it should be!) but not enough has changed. I remember the years in a row of the pentagon budget audit just completely being unable to account for billions of dollars and then everyone just moving on after realizing there's no way to enforce it without Congress and they made it clear where the money comes from (and where it goes).