Defense Contributions of Nato Countries vs the Social Welfare Spending of Nato Countries

[Steve-French]

A lot of people like to look down there nose at the United States; but most of these countries have not been meeting their end of the bargain when it comes to contributing to Nato defense. (Which is 2% of their GDP)

They also have jack shit for a military themselves and spend around 30% of their GDP on social service programs. I'm not opposed to social services by any means, but these countries are basically bumming the U.S.'s military support and then spending what they should be contributing to their defense and NATO on themselves.

The following attachments are two graphs that depict the Defense expenditures of Nato countries and the list of Countries ranked by social welfare spending.

Defense expenditures of Nato countries

Spoiler: Defence expenditures of NATO countries

List of countries by social welfare spending

Spoiler: List of countries by welfare spending

 

[Smok3r]

 

[Wet Blanket]

Personally, I'd rather see money spent on helping people than killing people.

 

[OverCoronavirus Pressure]

Other countries hate the US.
Is it jealousy because our women are hot, anger that we basically run that shit, or anxiety that they can't be Americans without passing a Freedoms test?

 

[Steve-French]

Personally, I'd rather see money spent on helping people than killing people.

So would I, but I don't live in La La land and you can't have one without the other. Without the U.S. the two largest military powers (by a large margin) would be China and Russia.

 

[panamaican]

So, we should cut back our military spending to increase our social welfare spending while the other countries increase their military spending?

I get the point of demanding that they hold up their military spending req's on NATO but what does social welfare spending matter unless we're saying that we would spend more on our social welfare programs as a result?

 

[Renard]

It's America's choice to spend 700B a year on the military, nobody is forcing you to do anything. You're free to slash that by half tomorrow if you wanted to, and allied countries would adjust and compensate their spending accordingly.

America is like having a weird friend who LOVES stamps. Completely obsessed with them. He has stacks upon stacks of the stuff, he reminds you every time you speak to him how awesome and rare his stamp collection is. He doesn't have letters to send or anything, he wants them just because. He doesn't care that he spends far more on those stamps that is needed, the expense is not logical. Allied countries are looking at each other and they're like "Well our friend's got the stamps covered, I guess. Let's order paper and office chairs."

 

[SammyPops]

This was the post WW2 paradigm, which the US thrived off for years, so whats the problem now?

 

[Jorge Luis Borges]

I could care less what other countries spend their money on. None of my business. It is my business though that they constantly fail to fulfill their military commitments of our treaty together.

US tolerance of NATO freeloading has allowed European governments to develop a complacent attitude toward their defensive commitments. In the words of Barack Obama:

 

[panamaican]

This was the post WW2 paradigm, which the US thrived off for years, so whats the problem now?

We now have a decision maker who seems antagonistic to the soft benefits of the relationship. I don't know if he's right or not but I do know that it will end our "first among equals" status.

 

[Teppodama]

Personally, I'd rather see money spent on helping people than killing people.

Depends on the people...for both.

 

[panamaican]

I could care less what other countries spend their money on. None of my business. It is my business though that they constantly fail to fulfill their military commitments of our treaty together.

US tolerance of NATO freeloading has allowed European governments to develop a complacent attitude toward their defensive commitments. In the words of Barack Obama:

True and those countries/Obama negotiated an agreement to get up to 2% by 2025. Trump isn't addressing a new problem but he is trying to push the compliance period forward despite the prior agreement. That's where the concerns start for me. We're renegotiating a deal on the fly and I think that always hurts relationships when done poorly.

You see it all of the time. 2 parties enter into a contract and then one party suddenly tries to switch up the terms after the fact. It often leads to the 2 parties not entering into mutually beneficial contracts in the future because the other side starts looking to make exclusively beneficial arrangements to protect themselves from a repeat performance of the last minute terms switch.

If you're never going to work with them again, fine. But if you're going to need them down the road, it can ruin those opportunities.

 

[SammyPops]

We now have a decision maker who seems antagonistic to the soft benefits of the relationship. I don't know if he's right or not but I do know that it will end our "first among equals" status.

You will still be first, but your equals will be Russia, North Korea, and maybe some other greats such as Sudan

 

[lifelessheap]

We should take a year off from funding it and use the money on our roads.

 

[HunterSdVa29]

well ya....

the refugees weren't trying to stay in Poland and Slovakia if you feel me, but the UK, Germany and Sweden

wonder why that is?

 

[flashNsmash]

turkey getting a lot of bang for the buck imo

 

[Steve-French]

So, we should cut back our military spending to increase our social welfare spending while the other countries increase their military spending?

I get the point of demanding that they hold up their military spending req's on NATO but what does social welfare spending matter unless we're saying that we would spend more on our social welfare programs as a result?

It would be nice if we could cut back our military and spend more on social services, but we are kind of stuck, because there is nobody out there to wipe our ass, because we know that China and Russia sure as hell aren't going to do it.

I guess this is the consequence of being the #1 super power and we made our own bed, but for people of the U.S. wanting to disarm and follow the model of the European/Canadian Socialist models have to realize that we can't do that, because in the end nobody has our back like we do their's.

 

[Rod1]

The number discrepancies is still pretty large, so its still a myth that the US subsidizes European welfare.

I mean Germany only needs to cut 3% of its welfare (25.3 of GDP) to meet NATO requirements (2 minus the 1.2 it already spends).

 

[cincymma79]

So, we should cut back our military spending to increase our social welfare spending while the other countries increase their military spending?

I get the point of demanding that they hold up their military spending req's on NATO but what does social welfare spending matter unless we're saying that we would spend more on our social welfare programs as a result?

Do you want money for those programs or not

 

[Rod1]

It would be nice if we could cut back our military and spend more on social services, but we are kind of stuck, because there is nobody out there to wipe our ass, because we know that China and Russia sure as hell aren't going to do it.

I guess this is the consequence of being the #1 super power and we made our own bed, but for people of the U.S. wanting to disarm and follow the model of the European/Canadian Socialist models have to realize that we can't do that, because in the end nobody has our back like we do their's.

Why not? you have nukes, you have like 10 carrier battlegroups, cut military spending in half and the US would still be as safe.