On Saturday, Feb. 28, Americans woke up to find their country at war with Iran. Breaking news alerts carried word that the United States had joined Israel in an unprecedented joint military operation aimed at Iranian targets.
The human cost is already jarring: one week in, Al Jazeera’s live tracker reports more than 1,300 dead in Iran, at least 11 in Israel, nine in Gulf states and six American soldiers.
But for millions of Americans already struggling through an affordability crisis, a different and urgent question is forming: what will this war cost their families at the pump, in the store and in their economic futures?
We know that wars are costly. Having extricated ourselves from protracted Middle East conflicts just three years ago, we have clear reference points that are not reassuring. The Costs of War Project at Brown University’s Watson Institute estimates that from late 2001 through fiscal 2022, the U.S. spent or obligated $8 trillion on post-9/11 wars: $5.8 trillion in direct costs and at least $2.2 trillion in future veterans’ care through 2050. Every dollar in that accounting was a dollar that did not go toward schools, bridges or health care.
These numbers reflect a long campaign, advocates of this war will say. President Trump has promised resolution in weeks, perhaps months — not years. His supporters point to Venezuela, where a U.S. military operation removed Nicolás Maduro from power, or to the June 2025 strikes on Iran’s nuclear program as models of swift, decisive action. The math tells a different story.
The June 2025 strikes alone cost an estimated $2.04 billion to $2.26 billion, according to the Costs of War Project. Regional operations — including Yemen, sustainment and Israel support — cost $4.8 billion to $7.2 billion.
In total, from October 2023 through September 2025, the U.S. spent between $9.65 billion and $12.07 billion on military activities across the wider Middle East.
The cost of war goes beyond military spending, and Americans are already paying it. Over the course of about a week, oil prices surged sharply to more than $100 a barrel — their highest level in years.
As of March 9, gas hit a nationwide average of $3.48 a gallon. When President Trump delivered his State of the Union two weeks ago, gas stood at $2.92, down from $3.11 at his January 2025 inauguration, a benchmark he routinely cited as proof of his economic stewardship. That ground was surrendered in under seven days. Economists estimate that every $10 rise in crude translates to roughly 25 cents at the pump.
And gas pricing is not simply about commutes to school and work. It is about getting goods to consumers, which multiplies inflationary pressure across the entire economy.
Transportation disruption along the Strait of Hormuz is no incidental detail. Nearly 20% of the world’s oil passes through that narrow chokepoint.
History offers three lessons worth holding onto. First, the United States does not have a reliable record of quick exits from Middle East conflicts. What begins as weeks becomes years, and what is promised as surgical becomes protracted.
Second, the financial costs of war consistently exceed early projections; the $8 trillion post-9/11 reckoning was not visible in the confident early days of those campaigns.
Third, the burden of those costs — through inflation, debt, higher prices on everyday goods and lost lives — falls hardest not on those who wage wars. The cost of war falls hardest on those who fill their tanks, buy their groceries and pay their bills: the poor, the underemployed and those least equipped to absorb rising prices and stagnant wages.
Sadly, there is a war that weary Americans are urgently waiting to see fought. It is the war for affordability. Right now, painfully few shots are being fired on that front.
Eric Morrissette is deputy secretary in the Maryland Governor’s Office for Children and a senior fellow at the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies.