Government’s Expenditures during the Cold War

Even though the C one-time(a) War period is a distant memory, encased in glass for incessantly worry some museum piece, our government is still disbursement as if the Soviet heart was in its prime. If the arms race is a forgotten memory, then why is the armed services still spending 86% of what it was spending during the Cold War. Its non that us Ameri push asides do not want a solid state force, we just believe that our military is wasting billions of dollars at the expense of our youngsterrens education and hale being.50 years ago our sylvan, and the entire conception was in disparate requisite of a strong U.S. military. We lofty our military budget, and gave the government and occult businesses an terrific appetite. Without a major threat to the f in solely in States since the collapse of the Soviet Union, our government seems to be in competition with itself. 50 years ago we sent tons and tons of troops afield to fight in a foreign land, while we pumped private b usinesses up with the manu accompanimenturing of military equipment.The submit for such products and the need for an over-healthy military valuation account is long gone. While we sunk billions after billions of taxpayers money on wars that we were boisterously proud to spend (it gave us all the prestige we could ever ask for), our Allies were investing in their squirtrens education and well being. The result now is that while we produce the most elite military capabilities, our childrens educational level is extremely under developed. European and Japanese children significantly outperform American children in math and upper-level reading.This should not be too surprising, our children argon studying history books that are from a decade ago. This creates ticklish obstacles for our children to keep up on current political relation and other global events. Also the over crowding of classrooms take shapes it extremely difficult for your child to get that personalized learning which may determine his or her ability to learn at all.Every child learns at a different rate and possibly in different ways, this makes it virtually out(predicate) for teachers to tap into every childs full learning potential. If your child needs that extra, personalized attention, but is not defined as handicap their specific learning needs allow most akinly be overlooked and that may be the beginning of your childs softness to learn. According to a study done by the state of Tennessee, trim classroom size in early grades (K-3rd) can improve a childs performance even after being dictated back into their regular sized class.Another major problem hinder our childrens education is the fact that the teachers with the priceless responsibility of developing our childs mind are absolutely underpaid. Teachers barely make an mediocre living and are often subliminal role models to our young students. Although in that respect are countless exceptionally dedicated teachers in Amer ica, a significantly higher salary would ensure the quality of almost all teachers. call up what we were taught about incentives at a young age, the carrot in social movement of the rabbit, well that would definitely apply for these individuals we need to count on everyday.So, where is all of the money going to come from to improve our childrens education, well, remember our whizz with that uncontrollable appetite? During the Cold Wars prime the U.S. was spending $325 billion a year. And today, with the Cold War boxed up and upchuck on a shelf, the military is still spending $290 billion a year (NCR,1999).This is an alarming figure that we are spending on a military without any outside threat to contend with, in fact it seems to be their only real mission is to play servant to the united Nations, fighting little skirmishes in countries that dont want our sponsor. superstar would be hopeful that since we are in an era of peace magazine that we could enjoy peace dividends. Howe ver, the military and those private sector businesses that created such an enormous appetite refuse to exercise a Post-Cold War diet. Maybe we need to e-mail the pentagon, they might be reading our childrens decade old history books, in that case they wouldnt know that the Berlin Wall is put down and the Soviet Union has collapsed.Another astonishing fact is that our country has drop dead the worlds largest arms dealer, selling to almost any country with the money to do business. And if they cant afford them, our government will put them on a payment plan, acting much like a scene right out of The Godfather. Is this our government, or is this Don Corleone, large deals with some pretty shady characters. One cant help wondering where all of this cold hard cash is going from these deals.It is no mystery that our government budgets are in desperate need of reform, well, there are active groups lobbying to change the spending habits of our government. One of the most stiff of these g roups is the Business Leaders for tender Priorities, which is comprised of influential individuals like Ben Cohen, cofounder of Ben & Jerrys and former assistant secretary of state, Lawrence Korb, along with a cabinet of ex-military and heavy(a) business leaders. The group is most certainly not an anti-military faction, however they are dedicated to refocusing the militarys useless spending (NCR, 1999). They are not opposed to our military having the best equipment possible, that is if someone were to donate it to them. If the determination is for the military to have a great new ship, or for our children to have a better education, of course the military is going to have to make overdue.Currently the federal government only participates in 7% of the livelihood for our schools, while the state and the local community split the rest. This is an raises enormous concerns due to the fact that poorer communities are at a significant disadvantage. Some communities can spend up to five times as much as less fortunate ones (NATIONAL PTA, 1996).To achieve these goals for a better future for our kids and upgrade more, our country, we need to make education our biggest priority. Adding up the militarys inflated $290 billion a year, and comparing it to whats left over for all other spending, including education, a meager $246 billion (NCR, 1999). This is an insult to our childrens organic evolution as growing intellectuals. 6% of the entire budget is allocated for our childrens education, this states the true fact that their education is not important. The money is truly there, we simply need to redirect it and our governments priorities. Like stated by Business Leaders for Sensible Priorities, The winners and losers are not going to be determined by the size of their gunboats, but by the level of their childrens level of education.