Cost of Iraq War Compared to Other US Wars (vanity)

07/09/07 | self (vanity)

[Sherman Logan]

 

 

Cost of US Wars Compared to Population, GDP and Federal Expenditures
War	US Population	GDP	Nominal War Cost	Real War Cost	War Cost as % of GDP	Total  Federal Expenditures	War Cost as % of Total Federal Expenditures	Total Federal Expenditures as % of GDP
War of 1812	8	1342	.09	1.2	.09
Mexican	20	1880	.07	0.7	.04
WBTS	30	2606	5.2	44.4	1.7	13.8	197.8	.53
Spanish-American	75	4943	0.4	6.3	.13	12.1	52.1	.24
WWI	103	5910	26	196.7	3.33	159.9	123.01	2.71
WWII	140	13483	288	2,092	15.52	876.8	238.6	6.51
Korea	152	12271	54	264	2.15	435.5	60.6	3.55
Vietnam	205	19614	111	346.7	1.77	944.6	36.7	4.82
Iraq	301	38232	405	405	1.06	2213.7	18.3	5.76

 

US Population is expressed in millions for the year the war ended.

GDP is expressed in year 2000 dollars for the year the war ended. Conversion rates are considerably less meaningful for years prior to 1900.

Nominal War Cost is expressed in (billion) dollars of the year the war ended.  This is not always the year war expenditure was highest, notably for WWI, when expenditures were much higher in 1919 than 1918.   It is the total cost of that war for all years, not just the year the war ended. Amounts do not include pension costs and other benefits for veterans, which over time tend to triple the cost of the war.

Real War Cost is expressed in year 2000 (billion) dollars for the year the war ended. This is not always the year war expenditure was highest, notably for WWI, when expenditures were much higher in 1919 than 1918.  It is the total cost of that war for all years, not just the year the war ended.  Conversion rates are less meaningful for years prior to 1900. Amounts do not include pension costs and other benefits for veterans, which over time tend to triple the cost of the war.  Conversion rates are considerably less meaningful for years prior to 1900.

Total Federal Expenditures is the total amount of money spent by the federal government in the year the war ended, expressed in year 2000 dollars. It is included to allow some comparison between the cost of the war and the size of the federal government in general at that time. These numbers do not include “off budget” items such as Social Security, which are an increasingly larger percentage as time goes by. Thus real Total Federal Expenditures are increasingly understated in later years, both in dollars and as a % of GDP. Conversion rates are considerably less meaningful for years prior to 1900.

War Cost as a % of Total Federal Expenditures uses year 2000 dollars for both amounts. It is included to allow some comparison between the cost of the war and the size of the federal government in general at that time. Conversion rates are considerably less meaningful for years prior to 1900.

Total Federal Expenditures as a % of GDP uses year 2000 dollars for both amounts. It is included to allow some comparison between the cost of the war and the size of the federal government in general at that time. Conversion rates are considerably less meaningful for years prior to 1900.

Notes: WBTS costs do not include Confederate War Cost or other numbers for the CSA, and certainly not the cost of the destruction of (mostly) southern property and infrastructure, mainly because I was unable to find good numbers for these amounts. Although by 1865 the CSA hardly had a GDP.  The capital lost just by the freeing of the slaves (in financial terms this constituted confiscation of capital) was probably at least $3B at the time, or perhaps $32B in year 2000 dollars. Some of this value was lost from Union states, but the vast majority was lost by (formerly) CSA states. The total financial cost of the war to the CSA was undoubtedly much higher than to the USA, and it was spread out over a much smaller population. However, I’ve been unable to quantify this cost.

I was unable to locate Total Federal Expenditures for the years the War of 1812 and Mexican Wars ended, but in each case the % applied to War Cost would be very high.  I was also unable to locate much good data on the cost of the Revolutionary War, so I left it out entirely.  Much of the US cost for the Gulf War was paid by contributions from allies, so I left this war out also.

Prior to WWII Total Federal Expenditures took a nosedive in the years immediately following each war, so the Total Federal Expenditures for the year the war ended is not representative of Total Federal Expenditures for the period in general.  Following WWII Total Federal Expenditures are not affected nearly as much by whether a war is in progress or not, they just trend upwards every year regardless.

 

 

[Sherman Logan]

We see so many claims that the Iraq war is wildly expensive. I thought comparing its cost to that of other US wars by GDP and Total Federal Expenditures at the time might be interesting. Data is the best I could come up with, but is inherently problematic, especially for the WBTS and other pre-1900 wars. It is also possible I dropped a decimal somewhere. :)

I am a vanity virgin, so please be gentle.

Moderator, if this is not an appropriate post, please feel free to delete or move it.

[operation clinton cleanup]

Thanks for posting. Also interesting that the US population has increased by almost 100 million since the Vietnam War!

[raybbr]

Total percentage of expenditure for Iraq according to you is 18%. The total cost of WWII, a war fought on a global scale is 238%. So, this tiny little war is 1/15 the scale of a global war. How can that be justified?

[Weeedley]

Very informative.

Nice to see it called the WBTS and not the inaccurate CW too.

[stm]

A chart you will never see printed in the MSM, that’s for sure

[Sherman Logan]

So, this tiny little war is 1/15 the scale of a global war. How can that be justified?

I don't know that is can be justified, but the reasons are pretty clear.

Compare the cost of providing and maintaining WWII military equipment to that of today.

Compare what we pay each soldier to what we paid in 1945. Volunteer armies are a lot more expensive per soldier than conscript armies.

Essentially we are spending a LOT of money in a largely successful effort to reduce the number of deaths and injuries suffered by our troops.

[Sherman Logan]

IMHO, neither term is entirely accurate, but I use WBTS because I think it is slightly closer to accurately reflecting the nature of the war.

Which term you prefer is generally determined by which side you feel was in the right. :)

Of course, I could have referred to it as the Great Rebellion. :)

[The_Reader_David]

Two critiques of the posting.

First, it accepts the left’s false partition of the Iraq campaign from WW IV (usually ill-named the ‘Global War on Terror’), just as it accepts the false paritioning of the Vietnam and Korean campaigns from the whole of WW III (usually called the Cold War).

Second, it’s missing our first foreign war: the Barbary War. Which it is good to remember, since our first foreign war was also against militant Islam.

[Weeedley]

War for Southern Independence in these parts...

[Sherman Logan]

I don’t disagree with your comments. I used the most commonly accepted definition of US wars.

Feel free to post numbers for our wars as you define them.

Given your criteria, WWIII, the Cold War, would be far and away the most expensive of our wars, mainly because it lasted over 40 years.

[BlessedBeGod]

Thank you for the post. Very interesting.

[LibWhacker]

Good work! Bookmarked.

[GoldCountryRedneck]

Compliments. With credits, are we free to use this in postings elsewhere???

[Sherman Logan]

The Barbary War was actually two wars. One fought from 1801 to 1805, the other during 1815.

The Second Barbary War was much more successful. After tangling with the Royal Navy in the War of 1812, Barbary pirates weren’t hard to handle.

[Sherman Logan]

Feel free.

[Weeedley]

Too much of that surge was via the unfenced soft underbelly of the lower 48 and and bumper crop of anchor-babies.... We should be at 260 M thereabouts.

[richardtavor]

If you lived in the South, it was referred to as the War of Northern Agression.

[VaRepublican]

I agree, good work and thanks for the work.Just one more piece of info that one will not see from MSM. I prolly missed it but what was source?

[Sherman Logan]

OTOH, without Roe v. Wade we might be closer to 350M.

[elfman2]

Thanks