Nationalpriorities.org is a very interesting web site that breaks down the total cost of the war ($318,500,000,000, or $1,075 for every living American). You can click on your own state to find out how much your state, county, or major city is paying in taxes to fund the Iraq War.
The site also had a section detailing tradeoffs: a calculation of how else the tax revenue might have been spent in your state had it not been required for the Iraq War. I pulled off the stats for California last night. Right now the section seems to be down, probably from traffic as a few major web sites are starting to link directly to it. The first URL hadn't been working last night but is now fine, so hopefully the tradeoffs one will be running again soon. Until then you can see some of the same information on a national or state-by-state basis at costofwar.com.
Total tax revenues spent on the Iraq war by...
California: $40,346,800,000
Los Angeles County: $10,072,800,000
Los Angeles: $3,399,800,000
Taxpayers in California will pay $40.3 billion for the cost of war in Iraq. For the same amount of money, the following could have been provided:
6,733,296 People with Health Care or
627,551 Elementary School Teachers or
4,767,634 Head Start Places for Children or
25,168,314 Children with Health Care or
235,246 Affordable Housing Units or
4,390 New Elementary Schools or
7,685,109 Scholarships for University Students or
616,017 Music and Arts Teachers or
741,482 Public Safety Officers or
117,140,845 Homes with Renewable Electricity or
601,790 Port Container Inspectors
The site also had a section detailing tradeoffs: a calculation of how else the tax revenue might have been spent in your state had it not been required for the Iraq War. I pulled off the stats for California last night. Right now the section seems to be down, probably from traffic as a few major web sites are starting to link directly to it. The first URL hadn't been working last night but is now fine, so hopefully the tradeoffs one will be running again soon. Until then you can see some of the same information on a national or state-by-state basis at costofwar.com.
Total tax revenues spent on the Iraq war by...
California: $40,346,800,000
Los Angeles County: $10,072,800,000
Los Angeles: $3,399,800,000
Taxpayers in California will pay $40.3 billion for the cost of war in Iraq. For the same amount of money, the following could have been provided:
6,733,296 People with Health Care or
627,551 Elementary School Teachers or
4,767,634 Head Start Places for Children or
25,168,314 Children with Health Care or
235,246 Affordable Housing Units or
4,390 New Elementary Schools or
7,685,109 Scholarships for University Students or
616,017 Music and Arts Teachers or
741,482 Public Safety Officers or
117,140,845 Homes with Renewable Electricity or
601,790 Port Container Inspectors
