[ptero]

I understand that it looks this way, but in my experience, human time is EXPENSIVE. Even a low pay grade soldier/sailor costs us a lot in benefits, insurance, medical, support, etc.

That cost may be coming from a different bucket and thus not visible to the folks who decide whether to invest $X in a systems upgrade, but in the grand scheme of things, getting humans to do the job that machines today do well is a big waste.

When you hear arguments that a badge reader is expensive and instead we will just put two soldiers at this or that door (24x7, btw) and no one jumps and calls BS on it, it is a strong indication of a broken system.