Slow days are great for browsing the net and finding interesting facts that will either make you raise your eyebrows or go WOW!!!
Today i found this lil gem in the news...apparently the cost of the Iraq war is around 1 Trillion dollars, read on....
When the Sunday morning political pundits began talking last year about the tab for the war in Iraq hitting $1 trillion, Rob Simpson sprang from his sofa in indignation.
"Why aren't people outraged about this? Why aren't we hearing about it?" Simpson asked. And then it came to him: "Nobody knows what a trillion dollars is.
"The amount -- a 1 with 12 zeros trailing behind -- was just too big to comprehend.
So Simpson, 51, decided to embark "on an unusual but intriguing research project" to put the dollars and cents of the war into perspective. He hired some assistants and spent 12 months immersed in economic data and crunching numbers.
The result is a slim but heavily annotated paperback titled "What We Could Have Done with the Money: 50 Ways to Spend the Trillion Dollars We've Spent on Iraq."
Simpson is no geopolitical, macro-economic, inside-the-beltway expert. He's an armchair analyst and creative director for an advertising agency, a former radio announcer and music critic in Ontario and a one-time voiceover actor.
His alternative spending choices reflect his curiosity and wit.
He calculates $1 trillion could
Pave the entire U.S. interstate highway system with 23.5-karat gold leaf.
Buy every person on the planet an iPod.
Give every high school student in the United States a free college education.
Pay off every American's credit card.
Buy a Buick for every senior citizen still driving in the United States.
"As I started exploring, I was really taken aback by some of the things that can be done, both the absurd and the practical," Simpson said.
America could the double the 663,000 cops on the beat for 32 years. It could buy 16.6 million Habitat for Humanity houses, enough for 43 million Americans.
Now imagine investing that $1 trillion in the stock market -- perhaps a riskier proposition today than when Simpson finished the book -- to make it grow and last longer. He used an accepted long-term return on investment of 9 percent annually, with compounding interest.
The investment approach could pay for 1.9 million additional teachers for America's classrooms, retrain 4 million workers a year or lay a foundation for paying Social Security benefits in 65 years to every child born in the United States, beginning today.
It's too recent to make Simpson's list, but that $1 trillion also could have paid for the Bush administration's financial bailout plan, with $300 billion to spare. It might not be enough, however, to pay for the war in Iraq. Nobel Laureate Joseph Stiglitz recently has upped his estimate of the war's cost to $3 trillion.
Simpson created a Web site companion to his book that lets you go virtual shopping with a $1 trillion credit card. Choices range from buying sports franchises to theme parks, from helping disabled veterans to polar bears.
Click on Air Force One, the president's $325 million airplane. The program asks: "Quantity?"
"At one point we couldn't find anybody who actually stuck with it long enough to spend $1 trillion," Simpson said. "It will wear you out."
Taken from courierpostonline.com
Id love to to have a crack at spending that cool Trillion.
But then i got thinking, well if thats what the US didnt get for their money what did they get?
Of course pro war people will say that Iraq got liberation, and the US have made the world a better place, but after some more digging i found this lil piece on http://www.about.com/. It tells us some of what 1 Trillion dollars did get ya.....
U.S. SPENDING IN IRAQ
Spent & Approved War-Spending - About $600 billion of US taxpayers' funds. In June 2008, President Bush signed a bill approving about 200 billion more for 2008, which brings the cumulative total to close to $800 billion.
U.S. Monthly Spending in Iraq - $12 billion in 2008
U.S. Spending per Second - $5,000 in 2008 (per Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid on May 5, 2008)
Cost of deploying one U.S. soldier for one year in Iraq - $390,000 (Congressional Research Service)
Lost & Unaccounted for in Iraq - $9 billion of US taxpayers' money and $549.7 milion in spare parts shipped in 2004 to US contractors. Also, per ABC News, 190,000 guns, including 110,000 AK-47 rifles.
Missing - $1 billion in tractor trailers, tank recovery vehicles, machine guns, rocket-propelled grenades and other equipment and services provided to the Iraqi security forces. (Per CBS News on Dec 6, 2007.)
Mismanaged & Wasted in Iraq - $10 billion, per Feb 2007 Congressional hearings
Halliburton Overcharges Classified by the Pentagon as Unreasonable and Unsupported - $1.4 billion
Amount paid to KBR, a former Halliburton division, to supply U.S. military in Iraq with food, fuel, housing and other items - $20 billion
Portion of the $20 billion paid to KBR that Pentagon auditors deem "questionable or supportable" - $3.2 billion
Number of major U.S. bases in Iraq - 75 (The Nation/New York Times)
TROOPS IN IRAQ
Iraqi Troops Trained and Able to Function Independent of U.S. Forces - 6,000 as of May 2007 (per NBC's "Meet the Press" on May 20, 2007)
Troops in Iraq - Total 152,850, including 146,000 from the US, 4,000 from the UK, 900 from Poland, 650 from South Korea and 1,300 from all other nations
U.S. Troop Casualties - 4,188 US troops; 98% male. 91% non-officers; 82% active duty, 11% National Guard; 74% Caucasian, 9% African-American, 11% Latino. 19% killed by non-hostile causes. 54% of US casualties were under 25 years old. 72% were from the US Army
Non-U.S. Troop Casualties - Total 313, with 176 from the UK
US Troops Wounded - 30,757, 20% of which are serious brain or spinal injuries (total excludes psychological injuries)
US Troops with Serious Mental Health Problems - 30% of US troops develop serious mental health problems within 3 to 4 months of returning home
US Military Helicopters Downed in Iraq - 68 total, at least 36 by enemy fire
IRAQI TROOPS, CIVILIANS & OTHERS IN IRAQ
Private Contractors in Iraq, Working in Support of US Army Troops - More than 180,000 in August 2007, per The Nation/LA Times.
Journalists killed - 135, 91 by murder and 44 by acts of war
Journalists killed by US Forces - 14
Iraqi Police and Soldiers Killed - 8,719
Iraqi Civilians Killed, Estimated - A UN issued report dated Sept 20, 2006 stating that Iraqi civilian casualties have been significantly under-reported. Casualties are reported at 50,000 to over 100,000, but may be much higher. Some informed estimates place Iraqi civilian casualities at over 600,000.
Iraqi Insurgents Killed, Roughly Estimated - 55,000
Non-Iraqi Contractors and Civilian Workers Killed - 554
Non-Iraqi Kidnapped - 306, including 57 killed, 147 released, 4 escaped, 6 rescued and 89 status unknown.
Daily Insurgent Attacks, Feb 2004 - 14
Daily Insurgent Attacks, May 2007 - 163
Estimated Insurgency Strength, Nov 2003 - 15,000
Estimated Insurgency Strength, Oct 2006 - 20,000 - 30,000
Estimated Insurgency Strength, June 2007 - 70,000
QUALITY OF LIFE INDICATORS
Iraqis Displaced Inside Iraq, by Iraq War, as of May 2007 - 2,255,000
Iraqi Refugees in Syria & Jordan - 2.1 million to 2.25 million
Iraqi Unemployment Rate - 27 to 60%, where curfew not in effect
Consumer Price Inflation in 2006 - 50%
Iraqi Children Suffering from Chronic Malnutrition - 28% in June 2007 (Per CNN.com, July 30, 2007)
Percent of professionals who have left Iraq since 2003 - 40%
Iraqi Physicians Before 2003 Invasion - 34,000
Iraqi Physicians Who Have Left Iraq Since 2005 Invasion - 12,000
Iraqi Physicians Murdered Since 2003 Invasion - 2,000
Average Daily Hours Iraqi Homes Have Electricity - 1 to 2 hours, per Ryan Crocker, U.S. Ambassador to Iraq (Per Los Angeles Times, July 27, 2007)
Average Daily Hours Iraqi Homes Have Electricity - 10.9 in May 2007
Average Daily Hours Baghdad Homes Have Electricity - 5.6 in May 2007
Pre-War Daily Hours Baghdad Homes Have Electricity - 16 to 24
Number of Iraqi Homes Connected to Sewer Systems - 37%
Iraqis without access to adequate water supplies - 70% (Per CNN.com, July 30, 2007)
Water Treatment Plants Rehabilitated - 22%
RESULTS OF POLL Taken in Iraq in August 2005 by the British Ministry of Defense (Source: Brookings Institute)
Iraqis "strongly opposed to presence of coalition troops - 82%
Iraqis who believe Coalition forces are responsible for any improvement in security - less than 1%
Iraqis who feel less ecure because of the occupation - 67%
Iraqis who do not have confidence in multi-national forces - 72%
Ok so after reading that im going to go out on a limb and say...maybe that trillion has not been used as wisely as maybe u and I could have spent it. Actually i recon that maybe its been how do you say...pissed down the drain.
Now im no financial wizard but in todays world economic crisis im preeeeety sure that 1 trillion dollars would come in handy right now. Still what do you and i know.
Best leave it to the Grown ups. They know best. Right?
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