Report Card
Corson, Ross
REPORT CARD Ross Corson Porkbarrels and People THE PRICE OF THE PENTAGON and BANKRUPTING AMERICAN CITIES by Employment Research Associates 400 South Washington Avenue, Lansing, MI 48933. $2.00...
...Box 4726, Albuquerque, NM 87196...
...Bankrupting American Cities analyzes the impact of military spending on the 266 metropolitan areas inhabited by three-fourths of the U.S...
...In fact, the authors add, "During the 1960s and 1970s, the Pentagon spent more money every single year than the after-tax profits of all U.S...
...The White House takes an interest in the isthmus connecting North and South America not only for geopolitical reasons, but to protect the claims of U.S.-based multinational corporations...
...Both demonstrate that the Pentagon is a formidable enemy of a healthy American economy...
...The bottom line: twenty-eight states are expected to suffer net losses...
...The transnational corporations, with their superior control of capital, technology, and marketing, have relegated the nations of Central America to roles of producers of unprocessed commodities and providers of cheap labor...
...The study's author, James Anderson, describes how "the Federal Government acts as a giant siphon tunneling tax money out of 176 metropolitan areas into those which have large military bases or very high military contracts...
...In addition to its general overview of Central America's political economy, this study offers an excellent profile of each country, with a list of U.S.-based companies doing business there...
...Government...
...Central America," the authors conclude, "has received an ever increasing infusion of foreign investment and capital without an accompanying redistribution of the wealth...
...population...
...The guns have been made in the United States and sometimes wielded by Americans...
...capital resources will be expended for unproductive and destructive purposes in the name of national security...
...U.S...
...This study projects the Pentagon tax burdens that states will carry in fiscal 1983 and compares those figures to the amount of money that will be returned in military contracts and salaries...
...The Price of the Pentagon calculates the number of jobs created by military spending and the number lost when taxpayers give to the Pentagon money they would have spent on their own needs...
...According to the authors' estimate, the average American family shelled out $2,000 to the Pentagon in 1981—money that could have been spent on consumer goods instead of weapons...
...the dollars have belonged to U.S.-based companies, and the dictators have depended on the support of the U.S...
...The industrial heartland from New York through Wisconsin is being "devastated" by the military tax drain, the author states...
...This thorough and comprehensive study analyzes the effect the ubiquitous corporate presence in the region has had on its politics and American foreign policy...
...corporations combined...
...Corporate Colonies DOLLARS & DICTATORS: A GUIDE TO CENTRAL AMERICA by Tom Barry, Beth Wood, and Deb Preusch The Resource Center, P.O...
...Government and American business have justified their meddling in Central American affairs in the name of development, claiming that our southern neighbors would benefit from American investment...
...Dollars & Dictators is heavily documented and includes many statistical tables, but is readable and helpful to non-experts...
...7.00...
...In addition to this negative impact on employment, military spending damages the capital base of nonmilitary industries: "Financing the military has siphoned a tremendous amount of investment capital out of the civilian economy...
...Military spending, the study notes, creates fewer jobs than equivalent consumer outlays because weapons production is capital-intensive and military-related industries operate under a higher rate of inflation than other manufacturing sectors...
...According to Anderson, "at a time of an acute and growing capital shortage in the United States, and at a time of declining U.S...
...The U.S...
...Guns, dollars, and dictators are a combination with a long history in Central America," say the authors of this study...
...The authors conclude that military spending in 1981 caused a net loss of more than 1.5 million jobs nationwide...
...The old myth that military spending creates jobs dies hard, but these two studies convincingly shoot the myth down...
...corporations have paid close attention to Central America since the turn of the century...
...Dollars & Dictators presents a vivid tally of economic imperialism and the political imperialism that accompanies it...
...productivity, more than $200 billion, almost $600 million per day, of U.S...
...Some cities, particularly in the South and West, do receive more from the Defense Department than they pay out, but no area is immune to a net loss of funds...
...2.00 each...
Vol. 47 • February 1983 • No. 2
