>2 aircraft carriers built and 2 on order?
>
>Wikipedia says the Gerald Ford cost about $15b including about $3b reusable R&D. But let's say $15b.
>

Let's look at it the way a CFO who manages the balance sheet- not the P&L- does.

Let's say $15 billion/per.
If the build 12 more that will have cost the balance sheet about $195 billion and added zero in useful assets.

Let's look at the F35. They've spent over a trillion on that one and again added zero to the productive capacity of the country.

Let's look at Iraq war - over $1trillion and counting- not only has it not added to our productive capacity- people have died because of it.

Just recently I read that the US invested $8billion on the Afghan air force and has declared that it was a waste of time and money.

The current federal deficit is just over $1trillion.

Have we not made those useless investments we'd be awash in cash without any diminution of our useful assets.

All this while people agonize over the Medicare deficit (which saves lives) and wring their hands and say that we can't afford to repair our crumbling rail system ( a useful asset.)

If I were a legislator involved in this insanity, I'd be talking about the wall too.