Eisenhower on the Military Industrial Complex

By Edward Harrison On Sep 1, 2009

Here, Eisenhower was talking about the military industrial complex in 1961. Today, one could make similar statements about other powerful lobby groups like the finance industry (or the healthcare and oil industries).

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Edward Harrison is a senior Editor at Bloomberg. He is also the founder of Credit Writedowns newsletter, a former career diplomat, investment banker and technology executive with over twenty five years of business experience. He speaks six languages and reads another five, skills he uses to provide a more global perspective. Edward holds an MBA in Finance from Columbia University and a BA in Economics from Dartmouth College.

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5 Comments

EV says 15 years ago

When Eisenhower said, “…three and a half million men and women are directly engaged in the defense establishment,” this made me curious about how many people in 2009 are “directly engaged in the defense establishment.”

What is that number today?

I would like to compare that number to our estimated population (of 307,408,708) today. When I compared the 3,500,000 to the full population of 179,325,671 in 1960, that meant that almost 2 percent of all Americans were “directly engaged in the defense establishment.”
I am curious if the percentage has grown, remained about the same, or decreased.

I am also curious the number of Americans directly engaged in the health industry today.

Thanks!
1. Edward Harrison says 15 years ago
  
  I wish I had those stats but I don’t unfortunately.

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