A US War Economy That Destroys Value

Shownotes The forever costs of America’s war on Iran could disfigure economic life for generations to come, around the world and in the United States. In an earlier era, war spending helped pull the United States out of the Great Depression by pulling unemployed farmers into the cities and retraining them for manufacturing. Even through the Cold War, many Americans viewed war spending as a major driver of high-quality manufacturing jobs and consumer well-being. The war economy since 9/11 has been different. The wars themselves drive antidemocratic currents and undermine well-being even for people, like most Americans, who are far from the battlefields. These wars also undermine economic life in less obvious ways, like incentivizing endless private sector investment in defense rather than more productive industries. Eamon Kircher-Allen joins Order from Ashes to explain the profound distortions of the modern American war economy. Inflation and a possible recession are only the most immediate economic costs of the Iran war. As the forever wars after 9/11 proved, runaway war spending disfigures every aspect of the economy. The true long-term costs of this war will be much higher than the price of military operations. Related article Commentary: “The Iran War’s Forever Costs Will Far Exceed the Immediate Pain for Consumers,” Century International, by Eamon Kircher-Allen Reports Referenced Report: “The Cold War and the U.S. Labor Market,” National Bureau of Economic Research, by Ilyana Kuziemko, Donato A. Onorato & Suresh Naidu   Joseph Stiglitz, “Structural Transformation, Deep Downturns, and Government Policy” (referenced in the podcast by a one-time working title, “Sectoral Dislocations and Long-Run Crises”), National Bureau of Economic Research working paper no. 23794, September 2017. See also: Joseph Stiglitz et al., “Mobility Constraints, Productivity Trends, and Extended Crises,” Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization 83 (2012): 375–93. Participants Eamon Kircher-Allen is editor-in-chief at Century International. Thanassis Cambanis is director of Century International.  Date: Tuesday, April 21, 2026 Episode: Order from Ashes 109