What does the military spend to get each piece of cannon fodder?

[tangent4ronpaul]

all services average: 9-10K per recruit
Army 22K per recruit

that's rent, salaries, advertizine, etc....

WOW!

-t

[krazy kaju]

Well if we took the entire military budget for fiscal year 2009 and spent it only on recruiting (using the Army cost of $22k per recruit), then we would have over 30 million soldiers. That's 15 times as many soldiers as the US military actually has. That's also roughly 10% of the population.

So a second look at the stats: for fiscal year 2009, the US federal government is spending $515.4 billion for the DoD and an additional $145.2 billion for the War on Terror. That amounts to $660.6 billion. The US military totals about two million soldiers. If the US military spends $22k per soldier, then where does the other $616.6 billion go?

If we split up the stats differently, then the US military spends over $330,300 per soldier. But if recruitment, rent, advertisement, training, benefits, and salary costs $22,000 per year per soldier than what happens to the other $308,300 per soldier?

Basically, what I'm saying is that we could increase the number of troops on the ground in Iraq and Afghanistan and probably accomplish the noecons' goals, if we simply stopped all of the wasteful R&D spending and simply spent on the basics.

That, or we could drastically cut the military budget.

[sratiug]

Well if we took the entire military budget for fiscal year 2009 and spent it only on recruiting (using the Army cost of $22k per recruit), then we would have over 30 million soldiers. That's 15 times as many soldiers as the US military actually has. That's also roughly 10% of the population.

So a second look at the stats: for fiscal year 2009, the US federal government is spending $515.4 billion for the DoD and an additional $145.2 billion for the War on Terror. That amounts to $660.6 billion. The US military totals about two million soldiers. If the US military spends $22k per soldier, then where does the other $616.6 billion go?

If we split up the stats differently, then the US military spends over $330,300 per soldier. But if recruitment, rent, advertisement, training, benefits, and salary costs $22,000 per year per soldier than what happens to the other $308,300 per soldier?

Basically, what I'm saying is that we could increase the number of troops on the ground in Iraq and Afghanistan and probably accomplish the noecons' goals, if we simply stopped all of the wasteful R&D spending and simply spent on the basics.

That, or we could drastically cut the military budget.

I think the OP is saying that's 22k for recruting only. So they could close all recruiting offices and just pay a 22k dollar signing bonus and probably get more volunteers than they could handle.