[SignalM]

Worked in one. They are safety nightmares. They give safety bonuses if “nothing is reported” so nothing gets reported. Working conditions suck.. you spend your time begging for AC in a metal can in 100 degree heat (outside) on top of that the craziest thing was how subcontractors made money. I was in test so we wondered why certain runs of cable were way out of spec. Turns out subcontractors are paid by the foot to install cable so it would take the longest route through. Nuts. Never work there.

[morkalork]

There's a BBC Nova episode about the soviet union with an apocryphal story about train schedulers being evaluated on the amount of cargo shipped by distance so of course, freight was sent on the least efficient route to its destination. Amazing to see the exact same metric get gamed again.

[number6]

German trains are evaluated on their timelines. If a train is more then an hour delayed passengers get their money back. So every train that runs into a high delayed is marked as "Cancelled" and if followed by an "Ersatzzug" that is curiously similar to the canceled train, because if the train is cancelled, the passengers don't get their money back if a Ersatz is followed promptly

[amenhotep]

I don't know if it was actually the most efficient strategy, but the thing I always liked to do in Transport Tycoon was find a coal mine etc in one corner of the map and a power station etc in the other one and build a line delivering between them - you got paid by the mile so when the train finally arrived the fee would be massive. Didn't realise that was actually an accurate (modulo apocryphal) element of the simulation :)

[taskforcegemini]

it's also what we do in Age of Empires 2 with our merchant carts.

[jki275]

None of that is accurate other than the fact it might be hot if the AC isn't running, and there are a lot of perfectly legitimate reasons why the AC might not be running.

We actively encourage reporting of all incidents, and cable runs are not determined by subcontractors trying to find the longest route. Cable runs are determined by drawings done by the Navy and they're installed in accordance with the drawings or people don't get paid. That's definitely one of the most absurd things I've ever heard.

I spent nine years on CVNs and many of those years in the yards installing, deinstalling, and maintaining equipment.

[Brian_K_White]

So, you worked with them on the same projects, and that's how you know they are lying about their own firsthand experience?

[Solvency]

so why does the government/navy incentivize such bloated inefficiency, slop, and misuse of resources/time/money/energy?

[tw04]

They don't. Op fabricated the story, as pretty much anyone in the Navy would confirm for you.

Source: several relatives in the navy working on ships, also have dealt with the contractors in question that run cable. Contractors absolutely do not get to determine the route cabling takes. There are endless reasons that would be insanity starting with basic security of the ship. Do you think random contractor X gets to loop cable through the reactor room because it'll make him a bit more money?

[Retric]

It’s really difficult to impose efficiency on outside contractors without them cutting corners.

Congress doesn’t want the government to do anything in house.

[alephnerd]

PPBE, though now that's changing with the new Defense Resourcing System [0]

[0] - https://ppbereform.senate.gov/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/Com...