Trump wants to kill the F-35 and move forward with the Advanced Super Hornet

to expand, can you provide some sites that you visit on this subject...curious about learning more

 

You can read a nice long thread here.
http://bbs.clutchfans.net/index.php?threads/f-35-is-such-a-turd.182580/

Somehow I am not surprised certain liberals think we should waste hundreds of billions of dollars on this project. Its like they claim to be resident experts on subjects and just automatically go against common sense.

 

I wonder the need for manned combat aircraft.

 

F-35 is just the continuation of the wrong-headed F-18 strategy, so might as well stick with the original. Kind of reminds me of the space shuttle/ISS debacle.

http://breakingdefense.com/2015/10/f-35c-a-wrong-turn-for-navy-cnas/

 

I don't think the title is provocative enough, perhaps it should be "Trump wants to rape and murder the F-35" or "Trump declares war on the F-35"

C'mon guys, get with the program.

 

Good article.

 

Defense related issues have been an interest of mine for a very long time, which might seem odd to some around here, since I was a Vietnam War protester in the late 1960's, was/am largely a pacifist, and consider myself to be a liberal fellow. I guess it's from growing up in the 1950's surrounded by WWII and Korean War vets, including my father, who enlisted and fought in WWII, and my uncle, a Marine lieutenant with the 1st Marine Division at the Chosin Reservoir and lucky to survive. In any event, I consider the subject one of my hobbies and have read extensively about it.

Some good sites for information (always remembering to read several sources to form your own opinions, of course) would include RealClearDefense, DefenseNews and the related DefenceTalk, BreakingDefense, DefenceTech, usni.org, defense update, the BBC, The Diplomat, the Lowy Institute, aspi.org.au (The Aussies have some excellent websites), Jane's (a great site, but expensive), defense in depth.co, and defense-blog.com are some of them, but I'm using a new iPad and have a far better list of sources at home (I'm out of town). NPR can also have some good stuff. Those are some of them. Dig around and good luck!

 

No, you spend the money because it gives your military at this point an advantage in its stealth technology. I wouldn't have built the stupid F35 to begin with, it wasn't liberals who green-lit that project

No dumbass, we were against this stupid project but the money has been spent and you can sell the damn thing as the production price is under a 100 million. It has a use over the F18 in it's stealth capabilities. You don't throw away a project after you have all that sunk cost. You need to have some business sense before you post.

 

Here, get some education fool:

CUTTING YOUR LOSSES: HOW TO AVOID THE SUNK COST TRAP

Evidence of the Sunk Cost trap
Many studies have demonstrated that people find it difficult to ignore sunk costs when making decisions. For instance, Ohio University Professor Hal Arkes and his co-author, Catherine Blumer, conducted an experiment in which they required subjects to decide whether or not to invest one million dollars in a plane that eludes conventional radar. One half of the subjects received information that the project already stood ninety percent complete. However, a competitor had recently begun marketing a better version of the same plane. The subjects had to decide whether to spend the additional one million dollars required to complete the project. The other half of the subjects faced a similar decision concerning a plane project. Just as in the other condition, a competitor had begun marketing a better version of the plane. This time, however, the case did not inform the subjects about the current status of the project (i.e., 90 percent complete). Instead, the subjects simply had to decide whether to invest one million dollars in this project. The results showed that forty-one of forty-eight subjects chose to invest the one million dollars when told the project was 90 percent complete. On the other hand, just ten of sixty subjects chose to invest the one million dollars when they knew nothing about prior investments. These results provided powerful evidence that sunk costs indeed played a role in individual decision-making processes.

University of California-Berkeley Professor Barry Staw and ESSEC Business School Professor Ha Hoang chose to look for evidence of the sunk cost trap in a real world setting, as opposed to simply conducting lab experiments (like the study above.) The scholars collected information on National Basketball Association (NBA) draft picks from 1980-1986. The NBA draft occurs at the end of each season, and league rules determine the order of the draft. According to this order, teams then draft, or select, amateur basketball players to play for them. Staw and Hoang assumed that the draft order served as a good proxy for the true opportunity cost of acquiring a player. Draft order represented opportunity cost because teams must forego all other players in order to select a particular athlete from a draft order position.

These two scholars measured the length of time each player spent with the original organization which acquired him. Their analysis indicated that a player’s draft order affected the likelihood that a team would trade or release him. In particular, they found a negative relationship between the cost of acquiring a player and the probability that the player would be traded or released by their original team at the end of any given year. In other words, teams were less likely to dispose of players during their career if those players had been more expensive to acquire. Staw and Hoang concluded that this negative relationship provided evidence that player utilization in the NBA depended upon “sunk costs as well as performance criteria.” Put another way, general managers and coaches in the NBA have a very hard time admitting that a projected star has turned out to be a flop. One might argue that a study of basketball players does not prove that business executives have a hard time cutting their losses. In fact, research shows that people in all fields, including business, have a difficult time ignoring sunk costs. While we might not like to admit it, most of us do not fare much better than these decision-makers in the NBA when we encounter the sunk cost trap. It ensnares us all.

Why do we fail to ignore sunk costs?
Psychologists do not know for certain why we have a hard time ignoring sunk costs, but they have proposed a few possible explanations. First, they have shown that the framing of a decision affects an individual’s attitudes towards risk. Individuals demonstrate risk aversion with regard to choices framed as potential gains. On the other hand, they exhibit risk-seeking behavior with respect to losses. If an individual makes a prior investment decision which yields poor results, they often view subsequent decisions as opportunities to turn around past failures. Meanwhile, individuals see the decision to invest no further as a sure loss. When individuals consider aborting a particular activity, they view past investments as wasted resources. This aversion to wasting money leads individuals to continue investing in a particular activity in hopes of utilizing, rather than wasting, their prior investments. Therefore, individuals may pursue risky investment opportunities, perhaps “throwing good money after bad.”

Another explanation focuses on the cognitive dissonance that occurs when we observe negative results after making a decision that we thought would be highly beneficial for the organization. Psychologists have shown that people rationalize past actions when faced with evidence that contradicts prior choices. This rationalization, or self-justification, may lead people to commit further resources to a particular course of action despite poor results. The further commitment of funds provides an opportunity to resolve the individual’s dissonance. By investing additional dollars, individuals can sustain the belief that these funds may turn around the situation and validate their initial investment decision.

Cognitive dissonance also leads individuals to analyze information in a biased manner. Experimental studies demonstrate that individuals place heavier emphasis on data which supports their initial position, while discounting discordant information. This means that decision makers may continue to pursue an unprofitable course of action, because they systematically emphasize any positive results, while disregarding negative feedback.

Making highly visible, public commitments to a course of action has powerful psychological effects as well. Individuals infer a strong sense of responsibility from the consideration and observation of their past actions. As a result, they become reluctant to change their position. They hold fast even in the face of negative feedback or social opposition. This explanation appears to apply to investment behavior, particularly acquisitions, since these managerial activities attract significant public attention. This highly visible, public commitment that takes place when a merger is announced may bind executives to that course of action. Indeed, in a study of corporate divestitures, University of Illinois finance professor Michael Weisbach found that entrenched managers will hold onto business units which they acquired, while new CEOs are more likely to divest divisions that are struggling. The new CEOs, of course, are not weighed down by the burden of sunk costs.

Finally, organizational culture may encourage the sunk-cost effect. Individuals in certain cultures may value persistence and perseverance. We often hear corporate leaders exhort their people to demonstrate a “can-do, never give up” attitude. As a result, unfortunately, individuals may stick to unprofitable courses of action in adhering to these values. These cultures may also discourage people from readily admitting mistakes. People may not cut their losses out of fear of being blamed for the failure and perhaps being fired.

http://iveybusinessjournal.com/publication/cutting-your-losses-how-to-avoid-the-sunk-cost-trap/

 

oh my lord, Dei - you totally missed the point I am making with Sunk costs. The point is that you have already spent the $400 billion in developing the stupid plane. Killing the project isn't going to get you back any of that money. But producing the plane and selling it will help you RECOVER SOME OF YOUR SUNK COSTS.

Morons everywhere here. Or maybe I should write moran so they get it.

 

It may be easier to drive in the point by putting things in exact terms.

The price of manufacturing an F35 has steadily gone down over the years. The production price of an F-35 $108M,$134M, and $129M per jet for the AF, Marine, and Navy version respectively. The price includes the plane as well as the profit for the contractors. source

The current unit cost of an F/A-18E/F is $67.2M, more if you want advanced avionics. So the price difference between an Advanced Super Hornet and a F35 may not be as much as you think, especially if you beef up the F18's avionics and the production price of F35 will continue to fall.

It made sense to dump the F35 program 10 or 15 years go, but not now. You'll have to spend a few billions in R&D to enhance the capability of Super Hornets when the F35 is already designed and ready for duty. In addition, an F/A 18 will never have the full capability of an F35 like stealth or advanced sensor integration no matter what you do.

Here's a good post on reddit written by a Super Hornet pilot.

 

Major kudos, jchu! I wish I could give you multiple "likes" for the excellent post you found on reddit, as well as your introduction to it. It's interesting to me that it is similar to what I wrote earlier to Space Ghost, except far better, of course. I hope the guy will read it and actually pay attention. He would learn something. Obviously, he has no respect for anything I write on the subject. It's his problem, not mine, that he chooses to belittle something a "liberal" writes on a topic simply because the guy leans a different way politically than he does. The idea that someone that doesn't share his politics could have reasonable opinions on a host of things is apparently foreign to him.

In any event, your find explains the points I was attempting to make far better than I could. Is there a link to that on reddit? I would love to read that discussion, and possibly participate in it. I've never "Reddited!"

 

Your original point was:

You were making a general business platitude which was plain wrong. Cutting losses of something guaranteed to bleed more money despite sunk costs is a well known business paradigm; not that I'm saying the F35 is that but your business advice is just plain wrong and you have to be a loud, flamboyant idiot about it.

Merry Christmas.

 

Appreciate the kind words!

Here's the link to the thread.

 

Trump is tweeting fool, with a very good brain.

Water is wet.

 

When you realize that it only took 18 months from Kelly Johnson's first napkin sketch to complete the first production A-12 (SR71 Blackbird), you begin to understand what an embarrassment the F-35 program has been.

 

Something to add to the discussion. The F-22 and F-35 were always intended to work together. The F-22 "busting down the door" for the F-35 (along with the B-2) in a near peer conflict, taking out the best fighters the opposition has, as well as taking out key defense installations. The F-35's coming on close behind, taking care of business. When the President cancelled the F-22 at around 180 aircraft (there were supposed to be at least 600), and continued pouring tens of billions into the F-35, that strategy went down the toilet, to a large extent.

Today? We have an F-35 about as expensive as the "too expensive" F-22, that isn't nearly as effective as a fighter and wasn't intended to be. Part of the problem, of course, being that the F-35 program morphed into an attempt to be "all things to all people," and that aspect can't be laid at the feet of Obama. The Marines and some of our allies badly needed a Harrier replacement (and the F-35B is becoming an excellent replacement, finally, and will turn the numerous Marine flat tops into excellent light carriers). Attempting to do that cost big delays and a big jump in the cost of the program, and led to both of the other models being less effective than they could have been. It should have been a separate program.