During the first World War, the French and the English found out that building (and then operating) new state-run munition factories was faster and cheaper than buying munitions from the privately-owned firms, and the production quality was also better, too. Something to do with competence transfer or something.
Presumably the draft also helped. Outside of war-time, I'm extremely sceptical state-run factories can compete with the free market..
Re:The Pentagon’s $52,000 trash can
by pauldenton on Friday June 23, 2023 @04:10PM
(#36451630)
What happened with Winston Churchill politically after WW2?
Did his war economy footing translate well to peace time?
gets some bunch of machinists in a room full of lathes and starts cranking
now all of them make silicon valley money off their skills just because of how bloated military contracting is*
Maybe given the history of things the concept of “Silicon Valley money,” in terms of margin, was set by very generous terms from the Cold War era military procurement.
The first initial public offering from Silicon Valley was in 1956 for a company called Varian, that sold microwave tubes for military applications.
https://diginomica.com/who-are-we-kidding-silicon-valley-was...
Re:The Pentagon’s $52,000 trash can
by red-iron-pine on Friday June 23, 2023 @12:27PM
(#36449093)
Aye, SV was a hub of Navy research and activity since before WWI. Moffett Field, the early version of NASA, and Stanford all made it a thing long before some 90s dotcom asplosion.
Why should Silicon Valley people be the only ones to make Silicon Valley money off their skills?
There's nothing inherent or ontological about tech that demands the money it does. It's needed, and the money is available, so that happens. If you know how to work a lathe, and the money is available, you deserve to be able to get it.
Pentagon: "Oh hey, I need special bolt X"
FreeMarket: "Sorry, was too expensive to make that here so we're making special bolt X in China"
Pentagon: "Um, but we are shooting China right now"
FreeMarket: "Don't worry I can get a production line setup in 3 months for 100 million dollars"
Pentagon: "But I need special bolt X TODAY!"