[systemvoltage]

May be we should rethink the cost-plus structure of space/defense projects. There is an incentive for suppliers to run the billable-hours treadmill forever. See the F-35 program. I worked in defense and it was pretty much an internal joke/culture to "Just bill it to Sam".

There is probably a balance between incentivizing suppliers and keeping them afloat for defense reasons in the name of space exploration. We could probably do both at the same time and get tax payers more for their buck.

Like wouldn't it be awesome to ship 4x JWSTs for the same cost? We could get 4x more data and have redundancy in the project, etc. Or we could run 1 JWST project + X more projects to explore space, send probes, etc. for the same cost to tax payers. I am not proposing this and they're silly suggestions, just to give some color to opportunity costs that incurs in these overbloated gov projects.