In today’s world, there is an ongoing competition for jobs, survival and success within nations and even internationally. In order to have a successful and secure future in America, every citizen must receive a good education.

However, the United States does not spend enough money on education and invests more of its budget on the country’s defense. According to usgovernmentspending.com, 24 percent of the United States’ budget is spent on defense, while only three percent is spent on education.

The United States is falling behind other countries in education. According to the National Center for Education Statistics, in a 2009 international assessment of 15-year-old students, six countries had a higher average score in reading literacy than the United States, while 17 countries had a higher average mathematics literacy performance and 12 countries had a higher average score in science literacy than the U.S.

The government should set education as its first priority, but it is putting more interest in the country’s defense. This is affecting the quality of our education and is putting the country behind in education worldwide.

Canada, which performed higher than the U.S. in reading literacy, mathematics literacy and science literacy, spends more on its educational system than on its defense. According to visuanomics.com, Canada spends 6.3 percent of it’s total budget on military and 12.7 percent on it’s educational system. Canada’s larger investment in education has had a positive outcome on their educational performance.

When the issue of budgets is presented, the money for education is one of the first areas that is proposed to be cut, unlike the money that goes to defense, which is almost never touched.

Some may argue that in order to have a secure country and future we must have an excellent military force.

However, if the citizens of the United States do not receive a good education and very few people are able to manage professional jobs and other positions to keep our country running, then how will such a country be able to support a powerful military. If we have a great educational system, this will secure our future because intellect can help build a strong country economically, politically and defensively.

It is important that the government invest more in education because education and knowledge is always needed, but wars eventually end.