Rising Costs: Augustine Revisited

Rising military equipment costs were famously identified by Norman Augustine with forecasts of a single aircraft air force by 2054. This paper presents and analyses an original data set for UK military aircraft. It provides evidence on cost escalation for various UK aircraft types comprising fighter/strike, bombers, military transports, maritime patrol aircraft, helicopters, trainers and civil aircraft. Continued cost escalation is identified for almost all types but with different cost escalation factors. It is concluded that the specific Augustine hypothesis of costs rising by a factor of four every 10 years might be an under-estimate.