Cost Of The War In Iraq example essay topic

Over the course of its long and rich history, the United States of America has been involved in many wars, by either taking a secondary or direct part in them. Looking through the wars the United States was directly involved in, such as the Civil War, Vietnam War, and the Persian Gulf War it can be seen that many faulty economic forecasts existed. Lincoln's Treasury Office predicted that the direct cost of the war for the North would be $240 million, however the actual cost was about 13 times the predicted cost. When it came to the War in Vietnam, the original budget projection in early 1966 miscalculated the cost for the subsequent fiscal year by $10 billion. Moreover, assuming that the war would be over by June 1967, the Pentagon underestimated the total cost of the war by around 90 percent. The war in fact continued until late 1973, and the total cost was ranging from $110 to $150 billion (Nord haus, 52-55).

The Persian Gulf War, the response to Iraq's invasion of Kuwait, cost the United States around $60 billion, even though the costs were estimated to be around 35-40 billion. Still the miscalculations and underestimations of the war in Iraq cannot be compared to any of the inaccuracies mentioned above. In my paper I would like to scrutinize how the war in Iraq has affected the U.S. economy using the sources published through out the years of the Iraqi operation. To begin with, I would like to give a very brief overview of the economical situation of the United States prior to the Iraq invasion.

The United States has a mixed economy with the world's largest GDP (2006) - $13.22 trillion. It took the United States a lot of time to achieve stability, opulence, and to start acting as the world leader it is now. Over the course of its history, the United States managed to successfully cope with many crises. During the times of Great Depression, for example, Franklin Delano Roosevelt's New Deal helped the US economy to survive from 1929-1932. It has also survived the crises after WWII, even though all economists predicted the U.S. economy to collapse because of switching back to civilian production (Walton, Rock off 36). In the seventies and eighties the US economic development was less rapid, still a high GDP and a low unemployment rate were maintained.

The Iraq War started on March 20, 2003 and is in action till the present times. The attack on Iraq affected the American economy as well as the country's wellbeing and world-perception overpoweringly. I will try to cover most of the ways in which America was affected by this war, concentrating mostly on the economical issues. As I have already mentioned above, most estimates put forward by White House officials in 2002 and 2003 were heavily undervalued. In fact, the Economist Intelligence Unit and the US Congressional Budget Office even predicted the war to last only a short time and not disrupt the economics. Still there were economists to warn that the economic effects would be negative, including lower growth, higher inflation and higher unemployment rates (Schiffer es).

Sadly, the negative predictions of the aforesaid economists proved to be true. Over the course of the War in Iraq, the taxpayers had to pay around $314 billion, furthermore the additional expenses of $450 billion over the next 10 years are projected. It has been stated that the Iraqi War is the most costly martial operation in the last 60 years, and there is a concern that high costs that were not considered before seem to play an increasing role in U.S. economic decision making. (Sterngold) According to the latest estimates, the cost of the war in Iraq could surpass $700 billion. The war is financed with deficit spending, while the remainder is being spent on training and equipping Iraqi forces that taxpayers are also responsible to cover. The war aimed to benefit both the Americans and the Iraqis, but in reality, is not making the United States more secure.

It is also harming the taxpayers by lumbering them with a debt burden, plus the lives of Iraqis are improving very slowly (Sterngold).