Is the U.S. Military Affordable

[Steve Blair]

There's a reason why Europe's industrialised countries used some welfare programs to influence social problems and the U.S. did not; Europe had no uncolonized West where the poor could go and grab natural ressources to fix their economic problems.

And if you think that's what drove Western expansion in this country I'd suggest you go do some more reading. There were elements of that to be sure, but for the most part it was spurred by wealthy Easterners looking for new investments and/or areas to exploit. The "poor family with a covered wagon" might play well on TV, but it wasn't really the backbone of the expansion.