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I think this comment is incredibly telling. Many people tend to treat problems that do not currently affect them because of the momentous, coordinated efforts of many individuals and institutions the same as problems that do not affect them because they are naturally nonexistent.
There is a huge difference between these two categories of problems. The first will become very visible when the constant behind-the-scenes work is no longer maintained. The second will not. Confusing these two seems to be one of the causes of the mess we currently find ourselves in.
> How do the billion people in Europe do it?
As a European, I can help with the conundrum: we DO have central governments, and they tend to take more responsibility for taking care of people than the U.S. federal government has ever been allowed to. Governments don't have to be continent-wide to exist.
Being ideologically captured "big goboment bad" is as bad as geopolitical analysis being "America bad".
Last I checked, they use government. Two governments, I think.
As others have already said, we Europeans do have central governments and there's fewer of us.
Depending on how you slice things, and what you count as ‘military’.
Based on the GOA, approx. $500 billion/yr (including veterans benefits) goes into actually running the military [https://www.cbo.gov/publication/59475]. Much of that appears to be VA benefits, and it’s increasing.
So the remainder (minus war bonds!) feels like the Military Industrial Complex, which seems to add up to around $500bln/yr.
Google annual revenue appears to be up to approx. $282 billion/year now.
So unlikely any MIC component is close, but overall the MIC still seems quite a bit larger.
550 billion is just for compensation. You also need to pay for the upkeep of bases, fuel etc.
MI complex probably still has larger revenues as Google, but difference is much smaller than you think and that is comparing the whole industry to just one tech giant. There are others with revenues as big or bigger.
The MIC. It isn’t just artillery shells.
In general though, I agree. The tech industry is an absurdly valuable target. And thanks for the updated revenue numbers!
I hope you realize that part isn't going anywhere any time soon.
And whose going to check that the food being produced is safe?
Honestly, we could do with less of this. It isn’t hard to tell if fresh food is safe. It’s impossible with hyper-processed nonsense. Increasing liability for producing unsafe processed food might be what we need to tip our food balance in a healthier direction.
You can tell if fresh salad has E. coli by the look of it? Or if fresh eggs contain Salmonella?
You're right–I didn't think about fresh, prepared foods.
> if fresh eggs contain Salmonella?
Pasteurised eggs (washed in a factory, I'll note), no. Fresh eggs, hell yes--they smell and look weird.
If only that. What about lead salts added to spices for better color (red pepper, curcuma)? What about all the other billions of ways to cut costs and make food unsafe, who is going to check for that in the absence of governments? "Increasing liability" is incredibly naive, the perpetrators don't care about that if the chance they are not caught is high enough, which it is if food chain monitoring isn't continuous.
Less of a problem with whole spices.
> What about all the other billions of ways to cut costs and make food unsafe, who is going to check for that in the absence of governments?
Local markets are good at sussing this out. We need federal regulation when supply (and thus trust) chains get longer. One of the best ways to undermine trust in the regulation we need is to over-regulate where we don't need to.
RFK going off about raw milk is Exhibit A for this. Would I drink raw milk? No, particularly not with the bird flu ruminating in dairy cows. Do I think banning raw milk makes it more likely (on the margin) that in 10 years I'll be eating leaded spices? Yes.
Note that I'm not arguing against food regulation as a whole. I'm arguing against its breadth at the federal level.
Very few people have the ability to properly mill dried red pepper at home.
> Local markets are good at sussing this out.
Unless it's long-acting toxins. Of which there are many.
You cannot reliably detect salmonella on a fresh egg with any human sense.
At least not prior to consumption.
Exactly
Obviously blatant waste and fraud should not be tolerated, but ignoring the huge value of the military is very short sighted. When you hear the phrase, 'backed by the full faith and credit of the United States government', what do you think that means? The US has been in a privileged position for so long they don't even realize why they are there. People flock to the USD because of stability, rule of law, and the ability to park a carrier strike force off any coast in the world and project that 'full faith and credit' the US speaks of. The military is not solely responsible for the US's success, but it is a large part.
The military itself has been trying to close unneeded bases, get rid of weapons it doesn’t need, etc. But Congress and the rest of the civilian leadership won’t let it because the civilian leadership is more interested in kickbacks from contractors than doing what is best for the military.
Military leadership has also been warning about the destabilizing effect of climate change and the dangers of our deficit.
The only inherent value of the USD is that you can pay US taxes in it. The “full faith and credit” bit meant something when you had to trust the USG to redeem it for physical gold or silver, but as you know that hasn’t been the case for a long time.
Now it’s about the same situation as the Tether fraud. Bitfinex doesnt need a carrier strike group for me to be able to trade USDT for cheeseburgers or gold coins.
People talking about the rule of law in the USA this week are especially comical. The graft and corruption are on full display for the entire world stage. They’re not even pretending any longer. It is now demonstrably clear that the value of the USD is not dependent on the rule of law in the US.
I assure you if people who matter start agreeing with you, we’re all in for a really, really bad time.