I’ve been employed in the military-industrial complex for 33 years. The waste is huge, but the waste is demanded by government contracts. Let’s say the government is going to buy a hammer. You get the contract. The contract insists you test 50 samples to destruction ($5,500 each test) and submit a report (40 hours at $155/hour). You’ve of course got to be ISO 9001 certified (55 million for the first year and 20 million per each year after for my most recent employer.) You’ve got to meet EOE, OSHA, EPA and all sorts of standards. You can’t use any number of banned materials or processes. The list goes on and on and on. Every line in that contract costs the manufacturer money and he doesn’t dare to say, “Wait, you don’t need that.” As a matter of fact, the manufacturer likes all those requirements because profit is a percentage of costs. If you make 10%, your take is much more on $50,000,000 than on $50,000.
We could provide a credible military at a fraction of today’s costs, but it would require undoing just about everything as it now practiced. For example, let’s say the country wants to buy 500 fighter jets over 10 years. The cost would drop dramatically if the manufacturer would build using automation. But since automation required 10 years to amortize and the money for the multi-year buy is allocated year by year, every fighter is built like it’s a one-off item. (Very expensive.)
I could go on for pages, but you get the idea. As Pogo said, “We have met the enemy and he is us.”
Not only that, but everything sold to the government has to meet certain specifications.
A few months ago, I was tasked with investigating the destruction of a computer. One of the rebuttals that the guy who destroyed the computer came up with was that the same computer is available at amazon.com for a third of the price I had determined to be the fair market value of the computer. So, to make sure my investigation would stand up to legal scrutiny, I had to do a lot of research on computer specifications. Only certain chips can go into a government computer, and they must contain chip types not used in other computers. The components can only be produced by approved manufacturers. The list goes on. As far as what the computer actually cost the government, that guy did not end up even coming close to reimbursing the government.
Could not agree more.
Don't even get me started on women/minority owned business contract requirements.
The entire DoD contracting process has become more of a social welfare program than a method of procurement.
“As a matter of fact, the manufacturer likes all those requirements because profit is a percentage of costs.”
Truth.
In Pharmaceuticals it’s even worse. They adore FDA requirements.