Total military and national security spending in the U.S. federal budget.

Every year people ask me, “Just what is all this military/national security spending you list?”. Well I have decided to type it all out once and for all. What qualifies spending as ‘military’ or ‘national security’ is subjective. There is strict interpretations which only includes funding with in the Department of Defense, and there are loose interpretation which include portions of the national debt and subsequent interest payments as a direct result of military spending. I try to strike a balance between loose and strict. Below is a table which includes all the military and national security spending that makes up the $799 Billion listed on the Death and Taxes poster for 2009.

The government has an official categorization of defense spending. It’s function 050.

“National Defense” (”Function 050″): Federal budget category that consists of the Department of Defense budget (”Function 051″); Department of Energy programs devoted to national defense, such as naval ship reactors and nuclear weapons (”Function 053″); and other defense-related activities including the Selective Service System and civil defense programs administered by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (”Function 054″).

But protecting our national borders and interests is not solely contained within function 050 spending. The table below details all the military and national security spending that make up the $799 Billion that I use for the poster. Each function and department is color coded.

Total Military and National Security Spending in the 2009 Federal Budget

source: 2009 Presidential Budget Request

Category	Department	Program	Budget Authority ($Billion)	Description/Justification
Function 051	Defense	Department of Defense	515.440	Where the bulk of the military spending takes place
Function 053	Energy	National Nuclear Security Administration	9.097	Maintains nuclear weapon stockpile and maintains application of nuclear energy. i.e. Naval reactors.
Function 053	Energy	Environmental and Other Defense Activities	6.857	Disposal of old nuclear weapons and cleanup of military test sites.
Function 053	Energy	Electricity Delivery and Energy Reliability	.008	???
Function 053	Labor	Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Fund	.948	Compensation to employees who were injured to radiation exposure at a nuclear testing site.
Function 053	Labor	Administrative Expenses, Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Fund	.108	Administration for the above. ^
Function 053	Corps of Engineers	Formerly Utilized Sites Remedial Action Program	.130	more nuclear testing site cleanup.
Function 053	Independent Agency	Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board	.025	Congressional oversight of the nuclear weapons complexes
Function 054	Commerce	Bureau of Industry and Security Operations and Administration	.015	Ensures an effective export control and treaty compliance.
Function 054	Homeland Security	United States Coast Guard	.340	Military functions of the Coast Guard
Function 054	Homeland Security	Acquisition, Construction, and Improvements	.003	???
Function 054	Homeland Security	National Protection and Programs Directorate	.841	For Infrastructure Protection and Information Security.
Function 054	Homeland Security	Federal Emergency Management Agency	.294	For Operations, Management and Administration
Function 054	Justice	Salaries and Expenses	.020	???
Function 054	Justice	Payment to Radiation Exposure Compensation Trust Fund	.031	Compensation to people exposed to radiation during above ground nuclear tests from 1945 through 1962.
Function 054	Justice	Federal Bureau of Investigation	2.793	For Counter-terrorism and salaries and expenses related there to.
Function 054	Transportation	Maritime Security Program	.174	Privately owned fleet that can support a Department of Defense sustainment in a contingency.
Function 054	Corps of Engineers	Office of Assistant Secretary of the Army (Civil Works)	.006	Arlington National Cemetery and the Soldiers’ and Airmen’s home National Cemetery administrative functions.
Function 054	Civil Defense	Selective Service System	.022	Administers military conscription.
Function 054	National Science Foundation	Research and Related Activities	.067	???
Function 054	Central Intelligence Agency	Payment to Central Intelligence Agency Retirement and Disability System Fund	.279	CIA retirement payments.
Function 054	Central Intelligence Agency	Intelligence Community Management Account	.665	Umbrella organization for oversight of the Intelligence community.
Function 054	Independent Agency	Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board	.002	Advises the President to ensure that concerns with respect to privacy and civil liberties are appropriately considered in the implementation of all laws, regulations, and executive branch policies related to efforts to protect the Nation against terrorism.
		Total Function 050	538.165
Function 153	State	International Peacekeeping Activities	1.497	Promotes increased involvement of regional organizations in conflict resolution and help leverage support for multinational efforts where no formal cost sharing mechanism is available.
Function 151	State	Counter-Narcotics Assistance	1.609	Provides funds for military equipment and training to overseas police and armed forces to combat the production and trafficking of illegal drugs
Function 152	State	Economic Support Fund	3.154	Promote economic and political stability in strategically important regions where the United States has special security interests, these grants allow the recipient government to free up its own money for military programs.
Function 152	State	Foreign Military Financing	4.812	Congressionally appropriated grants given to foreign governments to finance the purchase of American-made weapons, services and training.
Function 152	State	International Military Education and Training	.090	Military Education and Training grants to allied nations.
Function 152	State	Peacekeeping Operations	.247	Voluntary support for international peacekeeping activities.
Function 152	State	Nonproliferation, Antiterrorism, Demining, and Related Programs	.499	Funds go to nuclear non-proliferation programs, anti-terrorism aid, demining activities, and small arms destruction programs.
		Total function 150	11.909
Function 751	Homeland Security	Immigration and Customs Enforcement	5.364	The mission of ICE is to protect America and uphold public safety by targeting the people, money and materials that support terrorist and criminal activities. Established with the Homeland Security Act of 2002, the ICE is the largest investigative arm of DHS, and the second largest contributor to the nation €™s Joint Terrorism Task Force.
Function 751	Homeland Security	Customs and Border Protection	9.494	While one role of Customs is to regulate international trade and collect import duties, its other primary mission is consists of preventing terrorists and terrorist weapons from entering the United States.
Function 751	Homeland Security	Domestic Nuclear Detection Office	.596	Improves the Nation €™s capability to detect and report unauthorized attempts to import, possess, store, develop, or transport nuclear or radiological material for use against the Nation
		Total Function 751	15.454
Function 703	Veterans Affairs	Entire department not including benefits which is mandatory.	44.767	The government does not consider supporting our veterans military spending. However I make no distinction between the funding of current troops and the funding of past troops. Clearly the size of the active military has a direct relationship to the size of the veteran population and subsequent funding.
Function 051 (supplemental)	Defense	Global War on Terror	189.316	The administration uses $70 billion for this figure in 2009 which is just a placeholder pending further enactment of the 2008 request. The real estimated total is $180-200 billion. $189.316 billion was used at it is the 2008 estimated total.
		Total Other	234.083
		Total Military/National Security Spending	799.611

Total military and national security spending in the U.S. federal budget. has one response Add your thoughts.

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Death and Taxes Questions:

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• How come some numbers differ from last years poster?
• Why is the TSA not listed as national security related?
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General Questions:

What happened to TheBudgetGraph.com?

TheBudgetGraph.com has folded into WallStats.com. I will be providing new informational products and posters in the future on topics besides budgetary data, so a new website was needed to house Death and Taxes as well as other products. You can read about the transition here.

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Yes, I appeared on the show on April 15th to talk to Martha about taxes and government spending. You can read about the experience here.

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There are still some posters available for the 2008 edition. The 2004 and 2007 versions are SOLD OUT. Reprints can be requested at additional expense.

Death and Taxes Questions:

Why do you focus on the discretionary budget?

The discretionary budget funds all cabinet level departments and what is referred to most often when people think of the ‘federal government.’ It is the single largest part of the budget at one trillion dollars or roughly one third of pot. It is also the portion of the budget that Congress can easily push numbers around year to year which makes it a great tool for tracking our real national priorities. The total budget is depicted (not to scale) in the bottom right corner of the Death and Taxes poster.

Entitlement spending is also not included in detail for practical reasons. Social Security and Medicare cannot be broken down into small programs as other governmental departments can. The bulk of the funds are small payments to millions of people which cannot be graphed in the same manner as the rest of the poster. If entitlement spending were included to scale with the discretionary budget the overall detail of the poster would have to be decreased dramatically if the 24″x36″ size were to me maintained.

What do you consider military or national security spending?

While many people think the military is confined to the Department of Defense, that is not the case. The government labels national defense funding as 050. This includes subfunction 051 for the Department of Defense, subfunction 053 for defense activities within the Department of Energy, and subfunction 054 for defense activities in a variety of other governmental departments.

The total for function 050 is $611.131 Billion of which the Department of Defense accounts for 84%.

In addition to that is $8.627 Billion for security funding in the Department of State. Such items include Foreign Military Financing, the Economic Support Fund, and other international security, peacekeeping and counterdrug operations.

The Department of Homeland Security contributes another $14.858 Billion to secure and protect our national borders.

The administration does not consider funding the Department of Veterans Affairs to be military related spending. I disagree. Funding for our veterans is directly proportional to the size of our military and increases during war time when the wounded need to be cared when they return home. I make no distinction between the funding of current and past troops. This adds another $44.764 Billion to the total.

Funding for the Global War on Terror is very confusing and hard to measure. The administration has $70 Billion as it’s estimate for a supplemental GWOT appropriation. This figure is a placeholder pending further enactment of the FY 2008 request of which Congress only partially approved. The $70 Billion represents the absolute bare minimum the Department of Defense would need to bring everyone and everything home on the first day of the fiscal year. Obviously that won’t happen and experts have pegged the 2009 GWOT spending in the $180-$200 Billion range. I use the $189.316 figure because it is from the FY 2008 spending requests and remains the most accurate information to date on GWOT spending.

So subtract the erroneous $70 Billion figure from function 050 and add a more accurate $189 Billion and you have close to $800 Billion for military and national security. A full and detailed explanation of all national security funding can be found here.

Where is agency XYZ?

While the poster contains over 500 items, it is not inclusive of every government agency. The main reasons why an agency or department was not depicted are because its budget was under $200 million, it’s funding was paid for by offsetting receipts resulting in a small or nil budget authority, it was non-discretionary, or there simply was not enough room on the poster.

How come some numbers differ from last years poster?

The poster is of the President’s February budget request. While the President may terminate a program, Congress may continue funding for it, and unless the President veto’s the congressional resolution, funding will continue for the 2008 terminated program. This doesn’t stop the President from trying to terminate it again the following year.

Why is the TSA not listed as national security related?

The Transportation Security Administration was originally part of the Department of Transportation but moved when the Department of Homeland Security was created. The TSA is a collection of low level security guards that used to be privately contracted by the airline or airport, and are now part of the federal government. Although increasingly airport security is contracted out again to private companies under the TSA’s Screening Partnership Program. The two main goals of the TSA are airport security the prevention of aircraft hijacking and while these are important, they offer little in terms of national security. The TSA operates more like police for airports than any real counter terrorism program.

How come some circles are bigger than their parent circles?

This is because the funding for the large circles is not part of the discretionary budget or funded through loans and fees. Such is the case with the Small Business Administration which is a small department of $.468 billion managing a large amount of loans which are repaid.

Is the data accurate?

Yes. The figures used to create the graph come directly from the President’s official budget request and the comptroller of the Department of Defense. The Intelligence budget figures are estimates from globalsecurity.org.

Is the information impartial?

I make every effort to ensure the information is free from bias, however what is considered ‘National Security spending’ is a debatable term. Conservative totals only include the Department of Defense, and more liberal totals include portions of the national debt interest which may be military related. The total I use falls somewhere in the middle and is justified in this post.

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WallStats.com is born! Good-bye TheBudgetGraph.com…

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