tailieunhanh - Are cost over A Nilitary -Industry-complex specialy

Criticizes the current tendency to identify military-industrial-complex cost overruns with poor accounting procedures and to assume that such excesses are both new and unique to the prevent overruns, the General Accounting Office recently recommended that all defense contractors adopt uniform accounting , uniform bookkeeping can identify past, but cannot avert future, | ARE COST OVERRUNS A SPECIALTY David Novick March 1970 P-4311 ARE COST OVERRUNS A MILITARY-INDUSTRY-COMPLEX SPECIALTY David Novick The Rand Corporation Santa Monica California Recent discussions of cost overruns in military procurement have occasioned loud cries of anguish about the military-industrial complex. These discussions in their current phase refer to remarks by President Eisenhower in his farewell address. The recent recommendation of the General Accounting Office that all defense contractors be required to adopt a set of uniform accounting practices is part of this stream of events. Although these two are clearly separate and separable they are combined here because the public information media have identified them as cause and effect. Probably the most noteworthy such identification was the New York Times editorial on Tuesday January 27 1970. The idea of uniform accounting practices for defense contractors is not new and at all times has seemed both appropriate and possible. Such bookkeeping is now specified by the Armed Services Procurement Regulations ASPRs which are deficient in information requirements and really do not require uniformity. This is referred to here simply to eliminate it from a discussion of cost overruns since uniform accounting procedures although desirable can deal only with history. Any views expressed in this paper are those of the author. They should not be interpreted as reflecting the views of The Rand Corporation or the official opinion or policy of any of its governmental or private research sponsors. Papers are reproduced by The Rand Corporation as a courtesy to members of its staff. This paper was prepared for publication in Business .