The Real Reason America's Weapons Are So Expensive

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US defense spending is on track to top $1 trillion for the first time in history. Congress approved $900 billion for defense in 2026, and President Donald Trump has since proposed a staggering $1.5 trillion defense budget for 2027, the largest request in decades. Much of that money goes to weapons like the F-35, which can cost over $100 million apiece. So why are American weapons so incredibly expensive? In this episode of So Expensive, we trace more than a century of US military spending, from the Wright brothers selling the first military airplane for $30,000 in 1909, to Henry Ford's Willow Run plant cranking out a B-24 bomber every hour during World War II, to today's sprawling, trillion-dollar weapons programs. We also dig into how the defense industry consolidated from 51 major contractors down to just five: Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, Boeing, Raytheon, and General Dynamics. That shift gave these companies enormous leverage over the Pentagon. The result? Cost overruns, missed deadlines, and weapons systems that even the US military can't repair without going back to the contractors that built them. Read "Why Lockheed Martin's $2 trillion F-35 program is so expensive": https://bit.ly/4e3piKi 00:00 - Intro 01:01 - The First Defense Contracts 02:49 - World War II 05:54 - The Cold War 07:14 - The Last Supper 09:39 - Weapons Manufacturing 11:33 - Weapons Maintenance 15:18 - Reforms 18:10 - What's Next? 20:02 - Credits ------------------------------------------------------ #usdefense #militaryspending #militarypower #weaponsystems #defensecontractors #SoExpensive MORE SO EXPENSIVE VIDEOS: There's More Caviar Than Ever. Why Is It Still So Expensive? https://youtu.be/5Y_5MozNiZk Beyond & Impossible Burgers Were Everywhere — What Happened? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0mdzlfQQSl8 Inside Turkey's $2B Hair Transplant Tourism Boom https://youtu.be/uGkwc-JWdYw Business Insider tells you all you need to know about business, finance, tech, retail, and more. Visit our homepage for the top stories of the day: https://www.businessinsider.com Business Insider on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/businessinsider Business Insider on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/businessinsider Business Insider on Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/businessinsider Business Insider on Snapchat: https://www.snapchat.com/discover/Business_Insider/5319643143 Business Insider on TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@businessinsider The Real Reason America's Weapons Are So Expensive | So Expensive | Business Insider