Quality of Life, Balance of Power, and Nuclear Weapons (2015)

Sound Bite

Who has the most nuclear assets in the Middle East? Whose power is waning, whose increasing? Updated annually, these tables of economic, demographic and military indicators establish the pecking order for 236 countries, with estimates of all nuclear arsenals including rarely published data on non-signatory nations.The author also brings a rational perspective to the public debates on the supposed efficiency of private health insurance versus a “public option,” and the notion that taxation stifles the economy, by offering comparative statistics from different countries in the developed world.

About the Book

This statistical annual presents fundamental data comparing measures of (1) Quality of Life, (2) Balance of Power, and (3) Developed Market Economies since 1960. It is far more complete other statistical publications. Section 2 includes data about nuclear delivery systems and the number of nuclear warheads of all nuclear powers, including estimates of the Israeli nuclear arsenal which usually do not appear in the press.Many official estimates distributed by U.S. and British intelligence communities, for example estimates of Russian and Chinese military expenditures, are methodologically flawed, claiming to compare military expenditures at market exchange rates while apparently citing Russian and Chinese figures at purchasing power parities, thus inflating these numbers in comparison to those of other countries. This book corrects the distortion by presenting two different tables, showing military expenditures estimates both at market exchange rates and by purchasing power parities.Members of the U.S. Congress and others who care about the foundations of power politics in the nuclear age will find facts that speak for themselves in this novel yearbook.