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Does that factor in that probably alot of schools would have to be built as well? Or is that just the costs of providing schooling for those who do not currently have it? According to SAUS, in America in 1999 we spent almost $300 billion on elementary and secondary education and I do not think that includes private schools.
Of course, there is no "we". Some people are spending thousands of dollars on golf and golf equipment and t-shirts that say "will play golf 4 food". If we tried to stop them and divert that money to 'foreign aid', I think we would have a war on our hands.
Some more numbers are in my essay, although some are guesstimates.
Conspicuous consumption vs. government waste
In the latest State of the Union our millionaire President said: "the American people are using their money far better than government would have". Even Kurt Vonnegut seemed to take that for granted, talking about the billions of dollars the governments waste. That seems to be an obvious point if you are looking at Haliburton contracts and such.
However, I figure that the average American received about $200 in tax cuts and as the charities always point out, that is about one can of pop per day. Which is probably how the average American spent it. So I looked up some spending habits in my dated reference books. In 1990, per capita soft drink consumption was 46.3 gallons a year. In 1996, this rose to 52.0 gallons. In armchair calculations that works out to 100 two liter bottles times 300 million Americans times one dollar per bottle. Presto - 30 billion dollars!! Good thing that money wasn't wasted on disaster relief, teacher salaries, or highways.
As a janitor, I am also painfully aware of the fact that lots of the soda purchased is never drunk - it is spilled on the floor, thrown into a leaky trash bag, or just left sitting around in a restaurant, bar or gym for some peon to dispose of. Buying a can of pop and drinking half of it does not seem like a wise use of money to me.
I just saw on TV that 70% of sexual assaults on college campuses involve alcohol, so I took note that wholesale sales of alcohol in 1997 were almost 55 billion dollars. Also, it was interesting that America imported over 2 billion dollars of alcohol, so a portion of our spending is not even creating American jobs. If that 2 billion was spent on teachers, for example, instead of French wine, it would pay for 50,000 jobs which cost $40,000 a year.
Unfortunately, we are an exporter of tobacco to the tune of 5.96 billion. Smoking has declined to 26% from 38.7% in 1985, but Americans still spent 81.3 billion on tobacco in 2000. Perhaps most Americans feel that money was better spent on cigarettes than on fire departments, or bridge repair, or modernizing schools.
In 1995, 66% of households had a credit card, and 56% carried a balance. The median balance was $1500. So, let's see, 100 million households times .66 times .56 times 1500 times .05 means that Americans spent at least $3 billion dollars on credit card interest because, unlike the government, they have to live within their means.
I wonder if that means people are going out to eat when they really can't afford it, since America spends over $200 billion on restaurants. In 1982, Americans spent $33 billion on hotels and motels. All local governments combined spent ("wasted" according to Bush) only $14 billion on police "protection". In the same year, per capita spending on restaurants was $438 and on groceries was $1037. On the other hand, governments spent ("wasted") $483 on education per capita.
I use old data because I have an old County and City Data Book. They do not have such comparisons in the most recent County and City Data Book. However, in 2000 Americans spent 604 billion on groceries, 415 billion on dining out, 53.2 billion on jewelry, 48.8 billion on shoes, 275.5 billion on clothing, and even 3.8 billion on taxis. Americans also spent 103 billion on new autos, 58.6 billion on used autos and 168.1 billion on other vehicles. Although I wonder if all the jewelry, shoes, clothing and dining out is really necessary, I am not trying to say that all of that is wasted money. The point that Democrats tried to make before the tax cuts were passed was that the tax cuts provided enough money for a new car for the very, very wealthy who in the first place probably do not need a new car and in the second place had enough money under the old tax rates to buy a new car if they did need one. As for the rest of us, for the most part we got only enough money to buy a couple pairs of moderately priced shoes. Not that we want to turn that down, but why did it have to be tied to a new Lexus for Bill Gates?
Apparently we spend too much on groceries. According to the NY Times, liposuction is up 333% in the last decade and tummy tucks are up 392%. There were 1.1 million botox injections sold for at least $300 each. So there is $300 million spent on "health" care. There were 225,818 breast implants in 2002. Breast implants cost from $4000 to $5000, so Americans spent almost a billion dollars trying to artificially acheive some twisted standard of beauty. Oh well, 300 million here and a billion there, next thing you know you are talking about real money.
Speaking of health, if Bush is so sure that Americans use their money better than the government would, then it should not bother him that 1.3 million Americans chose to purchase abortions in the year 2000. Also, I made the following table on health expenditures.
per capita spending on health men's life exp. women's life expectancy
US 4499 73 79
UK 1747 74 80
Canada 2058 75 82
Japan 2908 76 82
Germany 2422 73 80
France 2057 74 82
Australia 1698 74 81
Italy 1498 74 81
Why is it that we manage to waste more than twice as much as any other nation on health care and we do not see the results in longer lifespan? Of course, some of that health spending is for breast implants, orthodontia, and face lifts.
Bush's notion that the American people spend their money better than the federal government does is particularly galling when you look at the distribution of tax cuts and spending cuts. Despite his repeated denials, his tax cuts went primarily to the wealthy. Government spending cuts, from low income housing assistance, medical disability payments, failure to extend unemployment, drug treatment, job retraining, head start, etc. are falling primarily on the poor and lower middle class. As Matt Bivens wrote when Congress was talking about tax cuts and spending cuts:
"However, a one-page summary of a CBPP analysis shows that huge as they are, the cuts are smaller than the Republican tax giveaway to just the top 1% of the population by wealth. In other words: If Congress instead were to vote for tax cuts for the poor, the middle class, the rich and the very rich -- but not the super rich -- there would be no need to cut Medicaid, school lunches, veterans benefits and the rest."
Bush also repeats his "every American deserves a tax cut" lie. The fact is that I make less than $14,000 a year and have no children and got nothing, nada, zip, zilch, and less than diddly squat from the $350 billion dollar tax cut of 2003. And I am far from a "lucky ducky" who pays no taxes. I pay about $600 in income taxes, $1062.74 in payroll taxes, about $300 in state income taxes, $785.5 in property taxes, and probably more than $300 in sales taxes (assuming I spend $5000 a year). I pay over $3000 in taxes, more than 20% of my stupendous income. I got nothing from the last Bush tax cut, and a mere $300 from the first tax cut.
In sum the idea that giving back wads of cash to the already rich is better than the collective action of our governments is false and is in complete disagreement with our country's founding principles. Our very founding document begins by stating that we have "unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted ..." The Constitution begins: "We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America."
To our founders, the government had important and essential work to do, but to Bush it is nothing but a wasteful hindrance to profits, something to be mocked, corrupted and abused, milked for the profits of his cronies, and starved of funds so that it can be "drowned in the bathtub." For some of us, our government is not the problem - the problem is the people currently occupying its highest offices.
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