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To: yard_man who wrote (51050)	12/24/2000 6:48:09 PM
From: maceng2	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 436258

tippet, I don't know that there is a practical solution. It would be nice if everyone in the industry had integrity Well, the weird thing is that manager I talked about was about the most level headed Christian as you could meet, and his wife was the most devout a Christian as you could say. Attended mass every Sunday etc. I'm just stating things how I seen them. pearly.

To: yard_man who wrote (51050)	12/24/2000 9:18:47 PM
From: Jack T. Pearson	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 436258

I'm convinced the US militaty-industrial complex is "out of control" -- billions are spent on crap that doesn't work or isn't needed with very little accountability, but on the other hand R&D does need to be secret ... I don't know that there is a practical solution. I believe you are correct. Government and industry are both to blame for R&D overruns on Government projects. Government jacks up requirements beyond the state of the art and specifies a schedule that is too short. Then the Government tightly constrains the funding that will be available during the first half of the development. It is typical for the government to specify requirements that will cost 50% to 100% more than the budget allocated. Industry proposes to satisfy the requirements at the budgeted cost because the alternative is getting out of the business. The Government accepts the lowest cost bid regardless of whether the low cost bidder knows what they are doing because no one has the guts to defend choosing the higher priced bid. Then the Government cancels or delays other programs to fund the over-run. The way to fix the problem is to halt the contract if the projected over-run exceeds 15%, bar the contractor from re-competing for the work, and fire the Government project team and their technical advisors. I don't think you would have to do that more than a couple of times.