My Congressman, Barney Frank, is not one to shy away from attention-grabbing remarks. One thing he’s been touting recently is a desire to cut the budget deficit by eliminating unnecessary military spending. An example he raises is the F-22 Raptor fighter plane: the F-22 is a very expensive, highly advanced jet that is being phased in over the next few years to replace the F-15. The problem with the F-22 is that it is designed almost exclusively for air-to-air combat — a rarity these days. Given the immense cost of the F-22 program,* there is talk that the operation could be shut down.
This is where things get interesting. Generally speaking, Congressional Democrats and liberal commentators have staked out Keynesian positions on fixing the economy; they argue that massive government spending is necessary to make up for lost demand caused by the recession. Republican leaders have argued the opposite: markets, not government will get the economy back on track. Take, for example, RNC Chairman Michael Steele’s insane comment that “government has never created a job.”
It becomes apparent, though — now that the F-22 is on the chopping block — that one type of job that government creates (and that many conservatives cherish) is that of the defense contractor. Lockheed Martin, maker of the Raptor, says that 95,000 jobs will go out the window along with the plane if it is scuttled. In the long run, the F-22 is not cost-effective and not really necessary for the US Armed Forces.
But as Jon Chait points out, cost effectiveness is of secondary concern in Keynesian economics — at least during a recession:
Obama has allowed the debate to revolve around the merits of each project. Normal spending is judged on those terms–whether the goods or services justify their cost. The point of stimulus spending, by contrast, is simply to spend money–on something useful if possible, wasteful if necessary. Keynes proposed burying money in mineshafts, so that workers would be hired to dig it out. (Imagine what the GOP could do with material like that.) World War II was an effective stimulus that, economically speaking, consisted of 100 percent waste. If war hadn’t broken out, we could have enjoyed the same economic benefit by building all those tanks and planes and dumping them into the ocean.
The lesson for conservatives is that if you can admit to yourself that government creates jobs in the defense contracting industry, you ought to be able to also admit that building bridges and roads creates jobs, too. And liberals can and should argue about the cost effectiveness of the military budget, but not at a time like this — when any spending is good spending.
*$65 billion has been spent on the program from its inception (including R&D costs), and 135 planes have been built so far — almost $500 million per plane.
UPDATE: Keep an eye on the F-22 debate after this.
True, for sure, but then, this is the kind of spending that tends to get reined back in the least when times are good (see: all the money wasted on useless missile “defense” systems). Granted, so is much of what Obama wants to do, but in the case of, say, renewable energy or health care, that’s the point. The thing is, the Republicans don’t seem to actually believe what they are saying. They just mean the government shouldn’t be allowed to create jobs for people who didn’t give lots of money to their campaigns. And arguably that’s true for many of the Democrats, too, unfortunately.
“The thing is, the Republicans don’t seem to actually believe what they are saying. They just mean the government shouldn’t be allowed to create jobs for people who didn’t give lots of money to their campaigns. And arguably that’s true for many of the Democrats, too, unfortunately.”
With Republicans that’s certainly the case. Their dogmas inform them that reducing spending is an end to itself. I think one could make a case that Democrats support spending on the so-called welfare state or the environment on the merits of the programs, but it’s equally plausible that it is part of a narrow calculation.
No, their dogmas inform them that reducing taxes is an end to itself. Spending is all well and good as long as it’s going to the things like “strong defense” (read: outrageous unjustified militarism). Republicans are not libertarians. Under normal circumstances I’d actually agree that reducing spending is an end in itself, at least at the federal level.
As for the Dems, I was referring more to things that sound good but are actually giveaways, such as ethanol subsidies, which do nothing to help the environment but do inflate grain prices, or regulations that masquerade as being for consumer safety while actually increasing monopolization.