The executive don't care. They earned enough to live rich until the end of their lives. Like locusts, they ate through Boeing's real value (its engineering, its reputation) and can now fly away their bellies full, leaving behind a devastated company.
We want curious conversation here. That certainly means not fulminating, as well as not repeating things.
You're far from the only one, of course; but this comment was heavily upvoted. In fact it was sitting at the top of the thread, emitting fumes. That's not what HN is for.
[1] - https://www.investopedia.com/articles/markets/032715/how-boe...
Expect problems to crop up in Boeing's weapons too sooner or later. I hope the US air force didn't let Boeing self-certify its products as much as the FAA did.
[0]https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Normalization_of_deviance
I think you're referring to the weakening/dismantling of regulatory requirements and enforcement favored by libertarians.
Please correct me if I've misunderstood.
Edit: Personally I think valid and helpful regulatory frameworks can easily drift into capture territory, so they must be vigilantly maintained. Also to keep incentives in alignment, the regulators shouldn't be able to jump back and forth between industry and regulation. Dismantling them, however, is worse. Like a long standing code base there's a lot of useful but misunderstood parts.
The only meaning I know for the phrase “Regulatory Capture” refers to the corruption of regulatory oversight by special interests.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regulatory_capture
https://www.investopedia.com/terms/r/regulatory-capture.asp
https://study.com/academy/lesson/regulatory-capture-definiti...
https://www.oxfordreference.com/display/10.1093/oi/authority...
> ...occurs when a political entity, policymaker, or regulator is co-opted to serve the commercial, ideological, or political interests of a minor constituency, such as a particular geographic area, industry, profession, or ideological group.
My description was just more succinct and didn't identify every single entity that could be coopted and every single group that could benefit. Regulatory capture is unnecessary and onerous checks and balances, not the removal of regulatory checks and balances that you implied.
Your descriptions both here and above seem incorrect to me. Regulatory capture does not mean onerous or unnecessary regulations, that is wrong. It also does not necessarily mean less strict regulations either, however Boeing v FAA in 2019 is a well known case of Boeing actively preventing oversight.
Regulatory capture means that the entities being regulated have control over the regulatory process, despite a conflict of interest.
> not the removal of regulatory checks and balances that you implied.
Regulatory Capture is when the checks and balances are biased in favor of special interests. You may have misunderstood what I said.
It’s hard to imagine and hard to find evidence of special interests making their own regulations more onerous, but I invite you to try. There probably are lots of cases of companies making regulations easier on themselves and harder on competitors.
And how exactly do you think this is accomplished from the perspective of people outside the captured regulatory system? Ie from the perspective of those not already on the inside of the corrupt regulatory scheme?
I’m not sure what your point is. Are you still stuck on the incorrect notion that “regulatory capture” can be summarized as onerous regulation? That simply does not work, but I’m happy to keep trying to explain why, if it’s not clear yet. There are also plenty of cases of regulatory capture dismantling regulations for everyone. Again, the single most relevant case in this thread, of Boeing circa the Lion Air crashes, is one of removing regulation. No regulations were made onerous or unnecessary in that case, it was the opposite of that, the regulation was bypassed for Boeing’s benefit, effectively removing it, and it remained unchanged for other carriers.
When regulatory capture occurs, sometimes regulations get harder, and sometimes they get easier. Whether it’s one or the other depends on the case, and depends on whose perspective it is. Trying to summarize “regulatory capture” as making regulations harder is just false, because that’s not what always happens, and not even what usually happens, and it completely fails to mention the primary relevant point: the special interest getting prioritized over the public interest.
It's gotten so bad that Boeing announced they will no longer accept fixed price contracts from the military because they are that broken as a company and no longer able to manage anything.
https://www.airforcetimes.com/news/your-air-force/2019/04/02...
I don't think this is an honest assessment. From your own source, Boeing's "Defense, Space, and Security" segment draw 39% of the company's revenue, while it's "Commercial Airplanes" segment accounted for 32% of its revenue.
I don't think that there is a single company on earth that would describe the source of a third of its whole revenue as something they do "on the side". Moreso when the top segment is barely over 5% larger, and is comprised of a coarse agglomeration of activities that may or may not be all related.
I don't fully understand the breakdown, looks like they're doing some finance BS to push costs into the commercial and military segments (which report losses) and list global services as pure profit for some MBA reason. How else does the segment grow 180% year-over-year?
As Boeing's 737 MAX problems started in 2018 and all 737 MAX were grounded in 2019, I'd be surprised if these figures are already reflecting a considerable drop in Boeing's revenue from commercial planes.
That's when potential customers start to say "hell no, get me Airbus' number" and Boeing's revenue from commercial planes starts to tank.
I’m no fan of Boeing, but they’ve been focusing on the military for a very long time.
But it feels like they aren't succeeding. Didn't Boeing lose out on all the advanced fighter competitions to Lockheed, so all their fighters are last generation and headed for obsolescence? I'm also under the impression that the ULA is losing to SpaceX pretty badly (but maybe the government is pumping money into it for reasons, I don't really follow too closely).
You _can_ make money hand over fist working with the US military, but winning giant money printing contracts is easier said than done. It’s a super volatile industry that Boeing unsurprisingly limits their exposure to.
Discussing anything related to the US military on HN can be frustrating, and the recent surge of “Boeing only really cares about their cash cow, defense” comments is no different.
Exactly. They care to the extent that they are liable and face the risk of being held accountable, which in corporate America is minimal.
If they're smart, on an Airbus.
They are in effect an incentive for execs to take bigger and bigger risks to deliver profits.
If their gamble pays off, they profit, if their gamble doesn't pay off they profit.
When the MBA and Private Equity craze kicked in, we had golden parachutes and other instruments which pushed companies into growth mode.
It is not immediately clear to me that incentivizing short term growth is a wise business strategy for the long term.
Yes, because I'd rather fly in a plane made by a "business" rather than "a great engineering firm." Why in the f*ck isn't this scumbag in prison? When you take a firm that produces a product that must ensure the safety of its users because the consequences are dire and you purposely subvert that, and then people die, you need a long stint of FPMIA prison. Also, cheated on his wife in their Golden Anniversary year. Lowest of the low.
Also while I have some reservations about the expectation of rape as something we joke about, I do love Office Space.
Usually the negative consequences of these decisions happen too far down the line for these managers to be held accountable.
On average, executive priorities are different from non-executives.
If one hires a plane engineer, one’s filter will be: person who is capable and motivated to engineer a plane.
If one hires an executive, return on investment is the metric in focus.
So it is safe to say that, on average, non-executives will care slightly more about the safety of the plane. (please notice words “on average” and “slightly”).
But I won't take that position since making up hypothetical arguments isn't a good use of anybody's time.
Said another way, vampires sucking out the blood and leaving an exsanguinated corpse behind.
> the underpaid (and presumably empty bellied) engineer has little motivation
Usually, salary budget is controlled by executives..
In case Boeing accidentally left a wrench inside a plane, the last person touching it was technician (and firing possibly is in order), but responsibility for deaths falls on organisation and those who control and shape it.
Hilarious! Well played!
Maybe venting a bit.
And since your reading… :-)
I honestly think (and am annoyed somewhat) that asking for statistics/study (popular on HN), or citation (even more popular on wikipedia), became convenient way to shut down discussion or dismiss opposing viewpoint.
Hypothetical example with a bit of exaggeration that illustrates what I observe frequently: personA:“people go to work in the morning”, personB: “study/citation needed”
Using phrases such as "I honestly think" are to engage in discourse as it invites discussion rather than presenting opinion as fact and leading to a request to back it up. The whole thread created a straw man caricature like out of the 1920's adding no value to the discussion.