Editing Parable of the broken window (section)

===Opportunity cost of war===
{{See also|Military Keynesianism|Post–World War II economic expansion|Creative destruction}}

[[File:Bomb damage on James Street, Aston Newtown, Birmingham, 1940. D4127.jpg|thumb|Partly-cleared bomb damage in an industrial area. The roofless buildings are houses. The corrugated metal in front of the pile of bricks and framing timber are the remains of several [[Anderson shelter|air-raid shelters]].]]
{{anchor|Opportunity Cost of War}}
Occasionally the argument has been made that war is a benefactor to society and that "war is good for the economy." A variant of this argument suggests that, while war cannot be fairly called a benefactor, it can and sometimes does confer some economic benefits.<ref>See for example economist [[Paul Krugman]]'s article in which he refers to the Fukushima disaster in Japan: {{cite web |url=https://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/03/15/meltdown-macroeconomics/ |title=Meltdown Macroeconomics|date=15 March 2011 }} And another in which he refers to the 9-11 attacks: {{cite news |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2001/09/14/opinion/reckonings-after-the-horror.html |title=Reckonings: After The Horror|website=[[The New York Times]] |date=14 September 2001 |last1=Krugman |first1=Paul }}</ref> However, this belief is often given as an example of the broken window fallacy. The money spent on the war effort (or peacetime [[military budget|defense spending]]), for example, is money that cannot be spent on food, clothing, health care, or other sectors of the economy. The stimulus felt in one sector of the economy comes at a direct – but hidden – cost (via [[production–possibility frontier|foreclosed production possibilities]]) to other sectors.

Bastiat himself argued against the claim that hiring men to be soldiers was inherently beneficial to the economy in the second chapter of ''That Which is Seen, and That Which is Not Seen'', "The Disbanding of Troops".

According to [[Henry Hazlitt|Hazlitt]]: {{blockquote|It is never an advantage to have one’s plants destroyed by shells or bombs unless those plants have already become valueless or acquired a negative value by depreciation and obsolescence. ... Plants and equipment cannot be replaced by an individual (or a socialist government) unless he or it has acquired or can acquire the savings, the capital accumulation, to make the replacement. But war destroys accumulated capital. ... Complications should not divert us from recognizing the basic truth that the wanton destruction of anything of real value is always a net loss, a misfortune, or a disaster, and whatever the offsetting considerations in a particular instance, can never be, on net balance, a boon or a blessing.{{sfn| Hazlitt | 1946  |loc=chapter 3: "The Blessings of Destruction"}}
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