Incorrect statement, Defense spending is only about 18% of the total US budget. The budget is split into two types, Discretionary and Mandatory. Discretionary funding covers all the departments, agencies, and other federal entities of the U.S. government (Defense, State, Justice, Labor, NASA, Housing, etc.). Defense spending is roughly half of the discretionary budget, this is where the "military is half of the budget"myth comes from. There are some non-discretionary emergency funds (called Overseas Contingency Operations Funding) that were used by Bush Jr. and Obama to fund the Iraq & Afghanistan campaigns that are separate from the official budget and brought defense spending to around 20 or 25% of the total budget. They're practically non-existent now, only adding 1 or 2%. You know what over half of the US budget is spent on though? Welfare. Social Security, Medicare & Medicaid, SNAP (food stamps), Unemployment, and all the other benefit programs fall under Mandatory spending, which makes up about 70% of the total budget.