There is a strong link between having a defence industry and having a hi-tech engineering sector. The strongest link is between the defence and medical sectors. The reasons for this are obvious; the R&D, development, approval and manufacturing processes for both sectors are almost identical.
The UK armed forces use British made standard infantry assault rifle and body armour. The SAS are allowed to buy their own equipment. They use an off the shelf American gun which is less than half the price and they buy their body armour off the internet, also at a fraction of the price of the inferior standard kit.
The monolith that is BAE swallows billions in tax payers money and is, in effect, a totally unaccountable branch of the public sector.
+1 :I recall a colleague telling me about their available budgets at BAE, figures universities and hospitals could only dream of, but allocated with a stroke of a pen at BAE. The success rate of many projects was average at best when compared to the input cost and duration.
And the 'real' economic benefit to the USA is what?
<snip>
As Marc Faber once said:
"The federal government is sending each of us a $600 rebate. If we spend that money at Wal-Mart, the money goes to China. If we spend it on gasoline it goes to the Arabs. If we buy a computer it will go to India. If we purchase fruit and vegetables it will go to Mexico, Honduras and Guatemala. If we purchase a good car it will go to Germany. If we purchase useless crap it will go to Taiwan and none of it will help the American economy. The only way to keep that money here at home is to spend it on prostitutes and beer, since these are the only products still produced in US. I've been doing my part."
The success rate it's even the worst of it; they usually produce an inferior and more expensive product to what's on the market already. All on the pretext of maintaining a stand alone defense industry. This, or course, is a nonsense since so much of their kit uses US technology which constrains who they can sell the finished product to and what the availability will be in a conflict.
(chuckle)
Your point is well made, but its not accurate.
That is a separate argument about globalization.
I totally agree and I have commented on it elsewhere.
Most of the defense contractors are American companies.
You can argue that they sub-contract out to foreign countries.
This below link gives the top 100 contractors and their countries.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_defense_contractors
As for Marc Faber himself, he frightens me.
Not because I disagree with him -on the contrary.
Because I now find I've been saying the same things for a year.
http://www.infiniteunknown.net/2010...uy-farmland-and-gold-prepare-for-a-dirty-war/
Its equally unbelievable that America cannot position itself globally to avoid people hating it by sticking to defending its borders, as opposed to attacking everyone else's.
(nods)
The Masters of the Universe like wars.
The name was Prescott Bush, whose Union Bank financed the greatest ethnic cleansing ever to take place in Europe.
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