Peace Economy? What is it? Why do we need
one? How do we get there? These are some of the questions Peaceworks is out to
explore in 2012. We encourage you to join us in working for a sustainable
economy that puts all to work with meaningful, productive employment.
Today’s economy is highly militarized,
but it wasn’t always so. Prior to World War II, the United States demobilized
after each war. For the past seven decades, however, our economy has been on a
permanent wartime footing. We’ve squandered tax dollars like a drunken sailor
on shore leave. While our population is only 4.5 percent of humanity, we pay
for nearly half of the planet’s military expenditures. U.S. bases ring the
world—more
than a thousand of them—with a presence on
every continent, on every ocean, in the skies and outer space.
Hundreds of billions expended each year
on the Pentagon has led to under-investment in other areas. We see crumbling infrastructure,
failing schools, and a nation falling far behind Europe or China in efforts to
transition to sustainable energy technologies. And our wars and weapons are not
making us more secure.
Overall military spending, not counting
interest on the debt, is now in the range of $870 billion a year. When we
factor out the $117 billion earmarked for the Afghan and Iraq wars, our non-war 2012 military spending level, inflation
adjusted, is higher than all
military spending during
the peak of the Vietnam War (when we had more than half a million troops
deployed in southeast Asia). For more info, visit National Priorities Project and
War Resisters League.
Diverting so much money, year after year,
away from productive investment is deeply problematic. It’s clearly not our
only economic problem, however. A Peace Economy needs to be a Just Economy.
Currently, we face a seriously flawed tax code and a structural deficit. Tax cuts
for the wealthy leave us with too little revenue to pay our bills. We face
growing inequality, with the growth in income over the past three decades going
overwhelmingly to the richest Americans. Meanwhile, working class and middle
income citizens face mountains of debt and, if they are lucky enough to be
employed, a paycheck that barely keeps pace with inflation.
A movement for a Peace Economy would
address these concerns and reject the bipartisan push for austerity. While
selective cuts in spending, particularly in the military budget, are desirable,
the effect of general spending cuts, at a time when the economy is already
severely depressed, is a prolonged period of profound dislocation and real
suffering for tens of millions of people.
As Sen. Bernie Sanders said recently in a
Senate Budget Committee hearing, “This country does in fact have a serious
deficit problem, but the reality is that the deficit was caused by two wars —
unpaid for. It was caused by huge tax breaks for the wealthiest people in this
country. It was caused by a recession as result of the greed, recklessness and
illegal behavior on Wall Street. And if those are the causes of the deficit, I
will be damned if we’re going to balance the budget on backs of the elderly,
the sick, the children, and the poor. That’s wrong.”
We invite you to join Peaceworks in our
work for a more peaceful, just and sustainable economy. Please check out our
upcoming Peace Economy Film Series and our People’s Economics class. Consider
joining our Peace & Justice Committee. Please contact us for more info. Positive
change will only come when enough of us seriously engage the system in a sustained
way. Join us.
