this post was submitted on 08 Nov 2023
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Science Memes

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submitted 1 year ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
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[–] [email protected] 11 points 1 year ago (2 children)

This comment doesn’t even make sense. For example, the USA government spent 37% compared to the GDP.

If you mean 10% of government spending towards science then that question makes sense.

The USA spends about $75billion of the $800billion defense budget on R&D. It spends another $120billion on non-defense R&D.

Which is about 1/31 of federal spending for the US.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Thanks for the correction. I never knew what word to use and used GDP because that's the closest thing to what I mean. Thanks again !

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

Honestly I thought your original comment was refering to basic science so the 10% would be huge.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (3 children)

Would be neat if they found a way to only spend like 200 billion a year (the GDP of Hungary and as much as the second biggest military spender) on the people grinder.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

But we spend nearly $200 billion just paying salaries. We spend the most because we are also an expensive country to live in and that means paying the folks who volunteer a decent wage.

We would have to significantly downsize the military personnel and pretty much operate as homeland defense only.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

That sounds great

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I don't think even a purely defensive military could be that small for the US. We have a lot of coastline on two oceans, plus distant holdings in Alaska and Hawaii. Even discharging Guam and the like would still be a lot of ground and ocean to cover.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

My googling says the US spent/185b on the DHS for this year and has 100b for FY2024, which includes the stupid mexico wall. I'm sure there would be more things to deal with not included in that number and it would take time to transition, but any reduction is a positive gain if you ask me.