Today in America, 60% of our individuals stay paycheck to paycheck, 85 million persons are uninsured or underinsured and 21.5 million households are paying greater than 50% of their earnings on housing. We’ve got one of many highest charges of childhood poverty of just about any developed nation on Earth, and 25% of older adults try to outlive on $15,000 a yr or much less. In different phrases, the US has fallen far behind different main international locations in defending essentially the most weak, and our authorities has failed thousands and thousands of working households.
However whereas so many People are struggling to get by, the US is spending record-breaking quantities of cash on the navy. Within the coming days, with comparatively little debate, Congress will overwhelmingly go the Nationwide Protection Authorization Act, approving near $900bn for the Division of Protection (DoD). When spending on nuclear weapons and “emergency” protection spending is included, the entire will strategy $1tn. We now spend greater than the following 9 international locations mixed.
I don’t usually agree with Elon Musk, however he’s proper when he says the Pentagon “has little concept how its annual finances of greater than $800bn is spent.” The Division of Protection is the one authorities company that has been unable to go an unbiased audit. It just lately failed its seventh try in a row and couldn’t totally account for large parts of its $4.126tn in property.
Only a few individuals who have researched the military-industrial complicated doubt that there’s large fraud, waste and value over-runs within the system. Protection contractors routinely overcharge the Pentagon by 40% – and generally greater than 4,000%. For instance, in October, RTX (previously Raytheon) was fined $950m for inflating payments to the DoD, mendacity about labor and materials prices, and paying bribes to safe international enterprise. In June, Lockheed Martin was fined $70m for overcharging the navy for plane elements, the most recent in a protracted line of comparable abuses. The F-35, the costliest weapon system in historical past, has run up lots of of billions in price overruns.
At this time, on account of large consolidation within the business, a big portion of the Pentagon finances now goes to a handful of giant protection contractors like Lockheed Martin, RTX, Basic Dynamics and Northrop Grumman. That consolidation has been extraordinarily worthwhile for the business: since 2022, these 4 contractors have introduced in $609bn in revenues, together with $353bn in US taxpayer funds, and recorded $57bn in earnings. Throughout that very same interval, they’ve spent $61bn on dividends and inventory buybacks to make their rich stockholders even richer.
These protection contractors additionally present their CEOs with exorbitant compensation packages. Within the final three years for which info is accessible, these firms paid their CEOs greater than $257m mixed – with annual salaries which might be about 100 instances greater than the secretary of protection and 500 instances greater than the typical newly enlisted service member.
How does this occur? How can we preserve handing large quantities of cash to firms that routinely overcharge the American taxpayer and sometimes interact in fraud? The reply will not be difficult. These firms – just like the drug firms, insurance coverage firms, Wall Avenue and the fossil gas business – spend thousands and thousands on marketing campaign contributions and lobbying. Within the latest election cycle, protection contractors spent practically $251m on lobbying and contributed nearly $37m to political candidates. Shock, shock! Most members of Congress vote for drastically inflated navy budgets with few questions requested.
The dearth of accountability on the Division of Protection isn’t just costing American taxpayer {dollars}. It’s costing lives. The USA is offering many billions of {dollars} to assist defend Ukraine from Putin’s invasion. When protection contractors mentioned they couldn’t ramp up manufacturing with out extra taxpayer help, Congress repeatedly appropriated emergency funding, with roughly $78.5bn going to purchase tools and providers from the most important protection contractors.
How did these “patriotic” firms reply? They jacked up costs. RTX elevated costs for Stinger missiles from $25,000 within the Nineteen Nineties to $400,000 in 2023. Lockheed Martin and RTX raised the value of the Javelin missile system from about $263,000 per unit simply earlier than the battle to $350,700 this yr. Comparable value hikes passed off for Patriot missiles and different weapons. And make no mistake: each time a contractor pads its revenue margins, fewer weapons attain the frontlines. The greed of those protection contractors isn’t just costing American taxpayers; it’s killing Ukrainians.
The USA wants a powerful navy, however we don’t want a protection system that’s designed to make large earnings for a handful of big protection contractors. We don’t must spend nearly a trillion {dollars} on the navy, whereas half 1,000,000 People are homeless and youngsters go hungry.
On this second in historical past, it might be clever for us to recollect what Dwight D Eisenhower, a former five-star basic, mentioned in his farewell handle in 1961: “Within the councils of presidency, we should guard towards the acquisition of unwarranted affect, whether or not sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complicated. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced energy exists and can persist.” What Eisenhower mentioned was true in 1961. It’s much more true at this time.
I will probably be voting towards the navy finances.
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