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Originally Posted by mrbeast
Yeah the Iraq war is bargin a by comparison!
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The real cost to the US of the Iraq war is likely to be between $1 trillion and $2 trillion (£1.1 trillion), up to 10 times more than previously thought, according to a report written by a Nobel prize-winning economist and a Harvard budget expert.
The study, which expanded on traditional estimates by including such costs as lifetime disability and healthcare for troops injured in the conflict as well as the impact on the American economy, concluded that the US government is continuing to underestimate the cost of the war.
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http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2006/jan/07/usa.iraq |
The author that the essay identifies anonymously as a noble prize winner and Harvard professor, is Prof. Stiglitz, and I linked his latest statements and calculation from mid-March this year four weeks ago. It is not 1 trillion anymore, that was in early 2006.
Note that one German "Billion" is 1 US trillion, and 1 german "Milliarde" is 1 US billion.
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Originally Posted by http://www.welt.de/politik/article1783456/Wir_werden_teuer_fuer_den_Irak-Krieg_bezahlen.html?print=yes
Alles in allem hat dieser Krieg, konservativ geschätzt, bisher beinahe unvorstellbare drei Billionen Dollar gekostet. Realistischer allerdings dürften fünf Billionen sein, rechnet man die langfristigen Leistungen für Veteranen ein, die Kosten, die es verursachen wird, unser jetzt ausgelaugtes Militär wieder auf Vorkriegsstärke zu bringen, sowie die erheblichen Kosten, die ein Rückzug aus dem Irak und die Neupositionierung von Truppen anderswo in der Region verursachen werden. Und dann sind da noch die Mikrokosten. Fällt ein Soldat, so bekommt seine Familie 500.000 Dollar. Das sind Kosten über das öffentlich bekannt gegebene Budget hinaus. Man kann sie nicht länger einfach unter den Teppich kehren. Und schließlich: Wer behauptet, dass wir auch nur vier, geschweige denn ganze 100 Jahre, wie John McCain gesagt hat, im Irak bleiben sollten, muss dem amerikanischen Volk ehrlich Auskunft darüber geben, wer die Zwölf-Milliarden-Dollar-Monatsrechnung bezahlen soll. Woher sollen die nächsten 1,2 Billionen kommen? Und wird das Amerika sicherer machen? Lassen Sie uns eher früher als später abziehen. Und vor allem: Hören wir auf zu fantasieren.
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I'm sorry that this is in German, but so far I was too lazy to translate it all, it is quite good a read.
Stiglitz argues in the short quote from that interview that the war has costed minimum 3 trillion so far, but more realistic is 5 trillion if including costs for veterans and the costs for rebuilding of the military, withdrawing the troops one day, rebuilding the military position in the region, and other delayed costs like that. Next he mentions microcosts like those 500.000 dollars the family of a fallen soldiers is receiving and that so far are not included in official war cost calculation. and finally he says that everybody demanding troops to be stationed in Iraq for the next four years or even 100 years like McCain demanded, must tell the american people who should pay the 12 billion per month that this would cost.
It is nice to see it in numbers, to visualize what sums we talk about. Sums are rounded.
5.000.000.000.000 $ war costs so far
9.444.443.000.000 $ outstanding US public debts oin 11th April 2008.
1.200.000.000.000 $ war costs per year in the future (minimum), quoted by the interview excerpt. That roughly compares to the ammount of money the IMF has just cautiously estimated the current credit crisis will cost the global economy in write-offs (annihilated money). Each year in Iraq costs one additonal credit crisis - but not all the globe, but the US economy alone, so the burden is even worse for america to bear. now see what the shared credit crisis already has done to the US economy, and then go figure regarding the war.
"The estimated population of the United States is 303,791,275
so each citizen's share of this debt is $31,088.59. The National Debt has continued to increase an average of
$1.67 billion per day since September 29, 2006!" (US national debt clock)