Re:The N95 mask shortage America can't seem to fix
by throwaway894345 on Wednesday September 23, 2020 @10:28AM
(#24567463)
> The machinery to make this is extremely complicated and takes 6 months or more to build, by which time there may be no demand. No amount of invoking the defense production act would change this reality.
Isn't this the point of the DPA? The government promises private industry that they will buy a certain amount of product to make it worth industry's while to increase production as though the crisis (and thus demand) were going to last more than 6 months? And I get that the machinery takes 6 months to assemble, but that's because everything was designed for a world where the demand for masks didn't rise or fall so dramatically; however, if we could build an atomic bomb in short order, surely we could figure out how to expedite the construction of fancy cotton candy machines in 2020?
Isn't this the point of the DPA? The government promises private industry that they will buy a certain amount of product to make it worth industry's while to increase production as though the crisis (and thus demand) were going to last more than 6 months? And I get that the machinery takes 6 months to assemble, but that's because everything was designed for a world where the demand for masks didn't rise or fall so dramatically; however, if we could build an atomic bomb in short order, surely we could figure out how to expedite the construction of fancy cotton candy machines in 2020?