The Cost Of Global Violence
by SavvyRoo on Dec 1, 2015 | Views: 111 | Score: 0
By our very nature, human beings are a violent species. We struggle against each other for land, resources, and ideology, manufacturing new and more efficient means to bring about destruction. Such violence undoubtedly takes a toll on the world, as billions of dollars are spent and countless lives lost in war and other conflict. To merely contain global violence, 13.4% of the world's collective GDP is expended. Indeed, the cost of global violence is a serious and worsening problem.
The Growing Problem
|Total global violence containment expenditures (in USD)|
In recent years, the world has become much less peaceful. With the rise of ISIS and the conflict in Syria, governments are spending more and more to prevent and contain the spread of violence throughout the world. Consequently, the total violence containment expenditures has risen substantially, increasing by nearly two trillion dollars globally in just six years.
What Are The Factors Of Containment?
|Crime and interpersonal violence||28|
When it comes to violence containment, the plurality of money is spent on maintaining military organizations. Of the 14.3 trillion dollars spent in 2014, 43% of the money was used by governments to sustain the military, and nearly 30% was used to manage the impact of crimes such as homicide.
The World's Most Violent Countries
|% of GDP spent on violence containment|
|Central African Republic||19|
Violence is present throughout the world, but these are the countries that experience the worst of it. The Middle-eastern nations of Syria, Afghanistan and Iraq stand as the three most violent countries of the modern world. Syria is forced to commit the plurality of its GDP to simply containing the violence within the country, as a whopping 42% of the nation's gross domestic product is spent to mitigate the spread of violent and destructive actions.