Late last year, I warned you about the extremely high cost of the current Iraqi war, but the expense is almost always expressed in billion-dollar figures.
The Brookings Institute recently estimated the real human cost of this war, apart from spreadsheets, politics and, of course, all the priceless, precious lives of our servicemen already lost, as detailed in this excellent CNN.com video. In everyday terms, what the $350 billion price tag (so far) could buy:
- America could hire 6 million new teachers.
- Every state could build up to 700 hundred new elementary schools.
- Each driver could have free gasoline for a year.
CNN.com January 10, 2007