Should the government increase or decrease military spending?

Last answered 5 hours ago

Increase

8,169 votes

51%

Decrease

4,164 votes

26%

Distribution of answers submitted by Canadian voters.

43%

Increase

26%

Decrease

23%

Neither, I am satisfied with the current amount of spending

8%

Increase, but only after our deficit is drastically reduced

2 Increase answers

1 Decrease answers

1 overlapping answers

Data includes total votes submitted by visitors since Dec 5, 2015. For users that answer more than once (yes we know), only their most recent answer is counted in the total results. Total percentages may not add up to exactly 100% as we allow users to submit "grey area" stances that may not be categorized into yes/no stances.

Canada’s defense budget is currently $20 billion a year which is less than 1% of its GDP. This is much less than the $600 billion a year the U.S. spends and the $6.5 billion a year the UK spends. Only 5 other countries of the 28 in NATO spend less. To join NATO each member country pledged to spend at least 2% of their GDP on military spending and defense and defend each other against threats from any non-member country. In a July 2016 U.S. Presidential nominee Donald Trump suggested that the United States would not defend NATO member countries who had failed to increase their military budgets to above 2% of Gross Domestic Product. France, Turkey, Germany, Canada, and Italy are countries that are currently spending less than 2% of their GDP on military defense.   See recent military spending news