Cost of Iraq War

At the Iraq war outset, the Bush administration produced an initial cost estimate of about $250 billion. They also announced that, using oil revenue, Iraq could “refinance its own reconstruction.”

Two economists, Linda Bilmes and Nobel Laureate Joseph Stiglitz, have now estimated the total (current and future) cost of the Iraq war to US taxpayers to be roughly $1 trillion. (Assuming 150 million adult US taxpayers, that’s $6700 for each of us!)

Their estimate does not include costs of:

• Current and future deterioration in US quality of life due to failure to address domestic needs

• Opportunity costs of failing to direct resources to improved education, health, basic science, etc.

• Costs of possible future derivative wars (Iran, Syria, etc.)

Read their paper here:

www2.gsb.columbia.edu/faculty/jstiglitz/Cost_of_War_in_Iraq.pdf

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