The Absence Of Competition

Competition is the engine that enables the public to have a say in obtaining products and services at a reasonable price. It has been known for some time that is not the case with government contracts, especially when it comes to Defense spending. It is also not the case outside the government in many instances. Cost over runs are a daily happening with defense contractors and the nations defense cost is over a half trillion dollars a year.

Rear Admiral William Landay, one of the Navy's top acaquisition officials promises that the Pentagon will do everything it can to foster competition and reduce prices for key shipbuilding projects. He was alluding to the fact that the six major shipyards are controlled by only two companies, Northrop Grumman and General Dynamics and that is a major barrier. Landay said companies with shipbuilding contracts won't be guaranteed future contracts for newer models of the same boats. Landay added that cost overruns for Navy ships have been a big problem.

Monopolies have never worked for America and its people or the Pentagon. They work for their own greed by controlling prices. It plays into the hand of being another element in the failure of our economic well being. I wrote a commentary titled, "Innovation, Lost in America concerning how Corporate America has been transferring wealth from those who should share in it to those who already have it and having a monopoly is a sure way to do it. The few who control the financial industry in this country proved it just last year and now we are being told they are ready to announce billions of dollars of bonuses to their CEO's and executives once again. Greed has become a sickness with them and Congress has to address that problem.

The major oil companies in the past 20 or so years have bought most of the large independent oil companies and said the purchase would make them more efficient, drill more wells, produce more oil and increase production. Yet today the country is more dependent on foreign oil then ever before. What the buy outs did was increase the bonuses and other goodies of the CEO's and executives of the surviving major oil companies and they still own or lease millions of acres of land they have yet to drill on. That says it all.