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With his Iran war of choice, President Donald Trump is mortgaging our children’ s futures, and is now saying that the federal government can’t afford to pay for those “little scams” like Medicare, Medicaid, and childcare.
Democratic voices had some thoughts about what the roughly $12 billion spent during the first week of the war could have paid for: the elimination of every American’s medical debt; extension of the Affordable Care Act subsidies for 20 million Americans for six years or housing assistance for a million Americans.
There will be costs for the long-term care of veterans with disabilities resulting from the war, as well as the ongoing healthcare costs to treat injuries and trauma. We already owe $7.3 trillion to current vets for disabilities incurred in previous wars.
Many veterans will be unable to return to previous work due to disability, adversely impacting workforce needs. And because taxes weren’t raised to pay for this war, there will be costs associated with borrowing billions more. Add that to our $39 trillion current debt, and the picture becomes even more bleak.
The costs to “rewire America’s place in the world … and our defense needs,” according to Justin Wolfers, a University of Michigan economist, will be thousands of dollars per year per American household for many years.
This war of choice with Iran, seemingly meant to distract us from the many failures of the Trump regime, will diminish our prosperity for years to come.
Mary Ann Larson
Bangor
