Will Defense Cuts Hurt Innovation?

The United States spends a lot of money on "defense" which both directly and indirectly finances a lot of research and development into defense-related technologies many of which have broader economic applications. So with the Pentagon looking at some budget cuts, it's not surprising to see some voices raising the concern that these cuts will reduce innovation. A few notes on this.

One is that the level of true R&D spending in the Pentagon budget is smaller than the headline number...