It is a common refrain from the right that defense spending creates jobs and boosts the economy.

In September, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta stated that defense cuts would increase unemployment.

Defense Secretary Leon Panetta is warning members of Congress that threatened defense cuts in the order of $1 trillion over the next decade would add 1 percentage point to the U.S. unemployment rate, a senior defense official said on Thursday.

In October 2011, House Armed Services Committee Chairman Howard P. “Buck” McKeon (R-CA) claimed:

As a fiscal conservative, I tend to oppose increasing government spending for the purpose of job creation. But I think we must understand that the defense industry is unique in that it relies entirely on federal government dollars. We don’t spend money on defense to create jobs. But defense cuts are certainly a path to job loss, especially among our high skilled workforces.

But this isn't really all that...um....true.

Dean Baker, macroeconomist and co-founder of the Center for Economic and Policy Research, recently blogged about a new study done by the Political Economy Research Institute at the University of Massachusetts.

Using the Bureau of Labor Statistics' employment requirement tables, they find that on a per dollar basis spending on health care or energy conservation creates 50 percent more jobs than spending on the military. Spending on education creates more than twice as many jobs as spending on the military.

The report, entitled The U.S. Employment Effect of Military and Domestic Spending Priorities: 2011 Update, makes it very clear while military spending may create some jobs, there are far more productive ways to create jobs.

Since mid-2011, the impact of military spending on job creation has been discussed prominently in the United States, as one component of the broader debate on how to reduce the federal government’s fiscal deficit. The figures we present here aim to help clarify that debate. Our key finding is that spending on the military is a poor source of job creation relative to spending on the green economy, health care, education, or even personal household consumption.

The U.S. government spent $689 billion on the military in 2010.2 This amounts to about $2,200 for every resident of the country. The level of military spending has risen dramatically since 2001, with the increases beginning even before September 11, 2001. In constant dollar terms (after controlling for inflation), military spending rose at an average rate of 5.3 percent per year from 2001 – 2010, i.e. through the full eight years of the Bush presidency and the first two years under President Obama. By contrast, the overall U.S. economy grew at an average annual rate of 1.6 percent over this past decade. As a share of GDP, the military budget rose from 3.0 to 4.7 percent between 2001- 2010. At the current size of the economy, a difference between a military budget at 4.7 rather than 3.0 percent of GDP amounts to $250 billion.

Domestic spending gives you more bang for your buck, too.

Nevertheless, because spending on clean energy, health care, and education produces substantially more jobs overall per $1 billion in spending, it also creates more good jobs. This includes jobs paying within a mid-range, which we define as between $32,000 - $64,000 per year, as well as high-paying jobs, i.e. those paying over $64,000.

There are many reasons why non-military domestic spending is more productive. Many have heard of the old $400 claw hammer and a $9,000 wrench but now the military is spending $400 per gallon of gas.

Parachuting a barrel of fuel to a remote Afghan base takes sharp flying skills, steady nerves and flawless timing.

It also costs a lot of money—up to $400 a gallon, by military estimates.

But the Pentagon is stuck with the expense for the foreseeable future, especially given the recent deterioration in U.S.-Pakistani relations.

"We're going to burn a lot of gas to drop a lot of gas," said Capt. Zack Albaugh, a California Air National Guard pilot deployed with the 774th Expeditionary Airlift Squadron.

I care more about teachers than $400 a gallon drums of gasoline. How about you?