42¢ of every tax dollar goes to military

As the tax due date approaches (this year, April 17), we wonder, "What the heck are we paying for?"

Self-styled fiscal hawks in Congress advocate cutting one social program after another in order to "balance the budget." But this is penny-ante stuff. Where the real fat lies is in the defense budget. Just taking a small percentage of that will fund a number of domestic projects this country desperately needs.

Here's more on the reality of where your hard-earned tax dollars go:

42% of Your Taxes Pay for War

42 percent. That is the percentage of your federal income taxes that went to pay for past wars and the military in fiscal year 2005 (FY05), the year for which we are now filing our income tax returns.

FCNL (Friends Committee on National Legislation) estimates the U.S. spent $783 billion in FY05 for past and present military activities. This includes funding for the Defense Department, Energy Department nuclear weapons programs, military-related activities of other agencies, foreign military financing and training, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, mandatory spending for military retirement and health care, veterans programs ($69 billion), and the estimated portion of interest paid on the national debt which can be attributed to past wars and military spending ($170 billion).

For the rest of the article, go here. For more on this issue see "Where do your tax dollars go?" from the National Priorities Project.

LP