The National Priorities Project has constructed an interactive site where you can calculate budget trade-offs in terms of what money spent for a specific federal program would buy in a state or locality if the decision was to spend that money there.
For example:
Taxpayers in Washington will pay $5.7 billion for proposed Net Interest in FY2011. For the same amount of money, the following could have been provided:
725,211 Military Veterans Receiving VA Medical Care for One YearOr:
Taxpayers in Washington will pay $5.7 billion for proposed Net Interest in FY2011. For the same amount of money, the following could have been provided:
1,025,785 Students receiving Pell Grants of $5550It gives you a sense of how much money we are talking about.
You can this for cities too.
Taxpayers in Olympia, Washington will pay $36.6 million for proposed Net Interest in FY2011. For the same amount of money, the following could have been provided:
6,602 Students receiving Pell Grants of $5550Check it out:
http://www.nationalpriorities.org/tradeoffs?location_type=1&state=53&program=708&tradeoff_item_item=278&submit_tradeoffs=Get+Trade+Off