The Huffington Post - On Tax Day, A Reminder That War Is Not Free

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How many tax dollars from your community have gone to fund the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq? And how else could that money have been spent?

The National Priorities Project helps you figure that out quite easily, with its Cost of War web site. It shows you the total amount nationwide, then lets you dig down to see the results by community. You can also calculate the tradeoffs.

And Brave New Foundation today is out with a new online short, starring Democratic Reps. Alan Grayson (Fla.), Raul Grijalva (Ariz.), and Barbara Lee (Calif.), reminding tax payers to consider how the war in Afghanistan is affecting the economy and job recovery in the United States today.

"The resident of Tucson," Grijalva says, "have paid $298 million of their tax dollars to the war in Afghanistan. That translates to 6,000 new jobs in the health care industry."

Over on Facebook, Brave New Foundation is also asking you to tell them what would you want to fix if we could spend those funds here at home instead .

Writing for TomDispatch.com, Jo Comerford, executive director of the National Priorities Project, found one mayor who wants everyone to know what he could have done with his city's 'war tax'.

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