Friday Photo: Iraq is all about the benjamins
In the current issue of FP, Wilson Center scholar and national security budget expert Gordon Adams takes a look at the spiraling cost of the Iraq war. He projects that in 2007, the United States will spend an average of about $14.7 million per hour on the conflict, or $245,370 per minute. Others have looked ...
In the current issue of FP, Wilson Center scholar and national security budget expert Gordon Adams takes a look at the spiraling cost of the Iraq war. He projects that in 2007, the United States will spend an average of about $14.7 million per hour on the conflict, or $245,370 per minute.
Others have looked at the numbers and come up with different estimates; artist Chris Jordan went in another direction entirely for his “Running the Numbers” series of massive posters.
For one poster, he assembled 125,000 images of hundred-dollar bills to make a picture of Benjamin Franklin. The result: a $12.5 million image, 8.5 feet wide by 10.5 feet tall, representing the average cost to U.S. taxpayers of just one hour of the Iraq war (Jordan uses a slightly higher figure than Adams calculates for 2006, but the point is the same).
And here’s a close-up:
Jordan’s artwork was shown last week at the exclusive TED conference in Monterey, California. He says it’s better to see the posters in person, so if you’re in New York in mid-June and July, you’ll be able to check them out at the Von Lintel gallery.
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