It's ok to be angry about capitalism

[Agema]

And there's the unspoken answer: that much of the cost can be borne by taxpayers, while private sector military contractors make enormous profits, and the latter have armies of lobbyists.

Maybe, but I'm also not sure that the current US administration is really interested in the arms industry.

After all, it's just massively incentivised a load of very wealthy countries to not buy from US arms manufacturers. Who can blame them? I wouldn't have my military dependent on an unreliable vendor nation, either.

 

[Gergar12]

So what you mean is not "there's no getting around that". What you mean is "there isn't currently political will to get around that in other available ways". The difference is worth pointing to.



Protecting maritime trade might cost a fraction of a percent of the defence spending of developed nations.

Defense is a necessary good; the US is not densely populated, nor does it have a population over a billion. We have a population of 4.22% vs the world, yet 25% of the world's GDP. If we didn't have adequate defenses, we would be a target for trade extortion at best, and nuclear blackmail at worst. As for protecting trade, every year it gets more expensive, to protect all of the world's oceans and ensure freedom of navigation everywhere requires like 900 destroyers with Aegis radars, since countries are getting more and more anti-ship missiles, drones, and soon to be sea drones from Iran, Russia, and China. We don't have 900 Aegis destroyers, and even if China were to win Cold War II, and gets the US to do this, we don't have enough sailors.

 

[Silvanus]

Defense is a necessary good; the US is not densely populated, nor does it have a population over a billion. We have a population of 4.22% vs the world, yet 25% of the world's GDP. If we didn't have adequate defenses, we would be a target for trade extortion at best, and nuclear blackmail at worst. As for protecting trade, every year it gets more expensive, to protect all of the world's oceans and ensure freedom of navigation everywhere requires like 900 destroyers with Aegis radars, since countries are getting more and more anti-ship missiles, drones, and soon to be sea drones from Iran, Russia, and China. We don't have 900 Aegis destroyers, and even if China were to win Cold War II, and gets the US to do this, we don't have enough sailors.

This has shifted from a conversation about whether it's possible or likely, and why, to one about whether it's desirable.

Nuclear blackmail is taken off the table with a much smaller nuclear capability than the US (or Russia, China, UK, France, India etc) maintain. This is not an argument for an ever-increasing bill. "Trade extortion" is also a bit of a ridiculous excuse.

 

[Gergar12]

This has shifted from a conversation about whether it's possible or likely, and why, to one about whether it's desirable.

Nuclear blackmail is taken off the table with a much smaller nuclear capability than the US (or Russia, China, UK, France, India etc) maintain. This is not an argument for an ever-increasing bill. "Trade extortion" is also a bit of a ridiculous excuse.

How Americans love their iPhones, avocados, t-shirts, computers, and coffee from other countries. If I were a dictator in say Yemen and the US isn’t responding to my piracy it would be what I would do to make sure my people don’t starve given the fact my people were rejected by the international order as a former Soviet ally.

 

[Silvanus]

How Americans love their iPhones, avocados, t-shirts, computers, and coffee from other countries. If I were a dictator in say Yemen and the US isn’t responding to my piracy it would be what I would do to make sure my people don’t starve given the fact my people were rejected by the international order as a former Soviet ally.

Please flesh this scenario out. How is Yemen going to extort the USA, and how is an even greater military budget going to stop this happening, if ~$900billion wasn't already enough?

 

[hanselthecaretaker2]

Interesting -



Something happened in the mid nineties that’s for sure.

 

[Agema]

Something happened in the mid nineties that’s for sure.

I might be able to explain that, if you mean Chinese GDP growth slowing heavily relative to the USA.

PPP is calculated though comparing the costs of similar items. So for instance imagine Country A has a nominal GDP per capita of $10,000 a year and Country B a GDP per capita of $5,000 per year, therefore nominally Country B is 50% as rich as Country B. However, stuff costs $10 in Country A and $8 in Country B. Therefore people in Country B are richer than they seem: their money goes further and they could by ~60% as much stuff by PPP.

A quick look shows China had a major inflation spike in the 1990s. This would fit with China's GDP (PPP) stalling relative to the USA, because the inflation and increased costs for goods and services in China will have offset China's nominal economic growth.

 

[hanselthecaretaker2]

I might be able to explain that, if you mean Chinese GDP growth slowing heavily relative to the USA.

PPP is calculated though comparing the costs of similar items. So for instance imagine Country A has a nominal GDP per capita of $10,000 a year and Country B a GDP per capita of $5,000 per year, therefore nominally Country B is 50% as rich as Country B. However, stuff costs $10 in Country A and $8 in Country B. Therefore people in Country B are richer than they seem: their money goes further and they could by ~60% as much stuff by PPP.

A quick look shows China had a major inflation spike in the 1990s. This would fit with China's GDP (PPP) stalling relative to the USA, because the inflation and increased costs for goods and services in China will have offset China's nominal economic growth.

What’s funny is shortly after that stall it kinda just took off around the turn of the century.

 

[Agema]

What’s funny is shortly after that stall it kinda just took off around the turn of the century.

Oh yes - It's the 90s-2000s when China really becomes the global manufacturing powerhouse.

One of the big complaints about China was currency manipulation, that it was keeping the renminbi artificially low in this period (thereby making it easier to import Chinese goods and encouraging companies to shift production to China). It's possible that also contributed to the inflation, because devaluing the currency would have increased costs of importing into China and thus raising prices.

This is also the point China absorbed Hong Kong (1999) following the end of the UK's lease. Hong Kong was at that time was over 10% of China's GDP (nominal, less by PPP) so a large boost, but also Hong Kong was a highly developed commercial hub full of expertise, which China was able to harness for the benefit of wider Chinese trade.

 

[BrawlMan]

$80 price hike for all Microsoft AA lAgames now.
https://x.com/Genki_JPN/status/1917932531997110550?t=G9upI_lwxM3bO1vCB1S3bQ&s=19

 

[BrawlMan]

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