Everyday Items at Boeing Company Prices

[Donnachaidh]

http://pogoblog.typepad.com/pogo/2011/06/everyday-items-at-boeing-company-prices.html


You may have seen our latest release on a leaked Department of Defense Office of Inspector General (DoD OIG) audit report this morning by now, but if you haven't, check it out. In sum, Boeing massively overcharged the Army and thus taxpayers for spare parts used on Army helicopters. The overcharges are even more stunning when compared to the prices for the same parts that could have been procured from the Defense Department's already-purchased spare parts inventory. In one case, Boeing charged more than 177,000 percent what it would have cost to buy the same part from the Defense Logistics Agency (DLA).

The parts are things such as sleeve bushings, straight metal pins, spur gears, nut and bolt retainers, and linear electro mechanical actuators. "A linear electro what??" you ask. Exactly. For most people, these items are not normal household items, although they may be mundane and familiar to mechanics. Yet most of the spare parts detailed in the DoD OIG report are cheap—and comparable in price to things with which the American public is familiar.

I asked POGO staffers for things they thought you could purchase for the prices taxpayers should have been charged for some of the spare parts Boeing delivered.

The cost of a straight metal pin: Boeing charged $71.01 when the item was available in a DoD warehouse for four cents.


More at the link --

[mike_c]

1. the MIC: harnessing greed to the power of patriotism in a town near you....

:puke:

[liberal N proud]

2. All the more reason we need to cut medicare and social security

We have to pay for Boeing parts.

:sarcasm:

[jberryhill]

3. But if we use the spare parts inventory, they won't be spare parts anymore

[DiverDave]

4. Oh, just move along

nothing to see HERE!

snort

[unblock]

5. typically they put "higher" standards on the items to justify higher prices

so they can't use an ordinary $0.04 straight metal pin, the specs call for a straight metal pin that can withstand a certain heat level or impact at a certain angle or whatever. often there's no LEGITIMATE need for these extra criteria, but if you throw them in, then the contract has to go to some expensive customer straight metal pin maker who can document that they meet the higher standard.


and who's going to fight it? politically, who wants to be the guy who insists on using flimsier materials just to save some bucks, and spend the rest of their career in fear that some soldier's going to die and blame it on that stupid straight metal pin that didn't hold up in combat conditions? your career vanishes AND you get to feel blood on your hands for the rest of your life.


of course it sounds ridiculous in practical, economic terms. but in political terms, the upside is very small and the downside is catastrophic. one of many reasons why military spending is completely beyond reason.


it's a bit like those job postings that interestingly enough, exactly ONE person in the entire world fits the description. applications are open to the public, as regulations require. but the requirements are based not on the employer's needs, but entirely on the specific credentials and background of the one person who the job is meant for.