The politics and pitfalls of reducing waste in the military

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Abstract
The political influence of the “military‐industrial complex” is responsible for procurement procedures and policies that are privately profitable but socially wasteful. Unfortunately, attempts to reduce military waste by reduction of the political influence of the “military‐industrial complex” may be counterproductive. The genuine public‐good benefits resulting from military spending are motivated in large measure by the private benefits this spending provides organized interests. If these private benefits were reduced by political reform in order to reduce military waste, interests organized around non‐military spending would face only public‐interest resistance to their attempts to divert government spending out of the military and into their special‐interest programs. The result could easily be less waste in the military but greater waste overall, as the composition of government spending becomes more distorted toward special‐interest programs.

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