Even the biggest Boeing fans will tell you that when they bought McDonald Douglas, that MD management took over Beoing and it became a company of bean counters.
MD basically was a Military Aircraft Company that didn’t know how to efficiently and effectly run a company.
If you were a military contractor in the 70’s and 80’s, you put your plant in the most expensive real estate because every thing was cost +10%. The higher the cost, the more the “10%”.
You lose all of the mid level engineers that can no longer afford to live near the factory. You get kids that live like a dog for a while, but they leave at the first offer. and when the oldtimers retire and move to Arizona, you got nothing but overpaid managers.
Those were what Boeing got with the C-17 and the 717.
if you search for my comments way back in the past, I was vilified for even suggesting that the Mc merger was the worst thing ever for Boeing