From: Montyneill-AT-aol.com
Date: Fri, 31 Jan 2003 20:19:12 EST
Subject: Re: AUT: questions



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Only on your last point, Nate (and I too am not an economist). I was talking 
today to a friend and fellow activist on the testing stuff. Her husband is an 
optometrist, and many of his patients came via a state-funded program which 
paid for exams and then the glasses if needed. Now they pay for exam, but not 
glasses -- so his patient list has quickly shrunk since no one wants an exam 
that can't lead to getting glasses because you can't afford them and the 
state won't pay. So his income has shrunken markedly.

Multiply this by how much? And on the other side, there is no evidence that 
this will be a economy-inflating war, the last one of which was Vietnam.

Quantifying this, making projections, I don't know, but it would be 
interesting to find out if any have done this. I saw a piece yesterday BTW 
which said that William Nordhaus, a mainstream economist (I think maybe he 
won a Nobel) estimated the real cost of the war could be $1.7 trillion, if 
there is a need for the US to stay a while, and even that did not include all 
likely costs (sorry, did not save piece, have no link to it). The indirect 
costs such as Nate suggests would make this 'real' cost higher yet, and as 
economists are wont, we could add opportunity costs to.

Monty

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