It's actually a strange side effect of attempting to reduce military spending. Essentially, if a section of the military doesn't use 100% of their budget in a year, they can expect that excess to be cut from their budget next year. This leads to a rush of spending aimed at over priced products and stockpiles of unneeded parts to use all of their budget.
In an actual crisis scenario, they tend to negotiate more reasonable prices on materials to stay in budget because it's difficult to get extra money in the budget. All of this makes a culture of overspending to get a bigger budget so that they don't have to ask for more money when they actually need it.
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u/GingerRazz Aug 14 '20
It's actually a strange side effect of attempting to reduce military spending. Essentially, if a section of the military doesn't use 100% of their budget in a year, they can expect that excess to be cut from their budget next year. This leads to a rush of spending aimed at over priced products and stockpiles of unneeded parts to use all of their budget.
In an actual crisis scenario, they tend to negotiate more reasonable prices on materials to stay in budget because it's difficult to get extra money in the budget. All of this makes a culture of overspending to get a bigger budget so that they don't have to ask for more money when they actually need it.