Does Spending on Defence Cut Spending on Health?: A Time-Series Analysis of the U.S. Economy 1929–74

When public programme demands exceed resources, tradeoffs between different public policies occur; that is, one policy gains while another loses in the allocation of these resources. Tradeoffs are most easily measured in terms of budgetary expenditures. If the budget is expanding, the consequences of tradeoffs are less severe than when the budget contracts or remains stable, and budgetary decisions involve zero-sum games. However, the concept of tradeoff is still relevant in an expanding budget since decisions are made about how the additional resources are to be allocated, and while all policy areas may gain, some obviously will receive more resources than others.