CONGRESSIONAL BUDGET OFFICE Comparing the Costs of Submarine Maintenance at Public and Private Shipyards September 2018 CBO Recently, several Navy attack submarines have been delayed in receiving maintenance at public shipyards. As a result, they have missed deployments or had shortened deployments. The Navy could send some submarines to private shipyards for overhauls. However, the Navy has stated that it prefers using public shipyards because it believes that they cost less. 1 CBO CBO was asked by members of the House Armed Services Committee to compare the costs of submarine maintenance at public and private shipyards. CBO’s analysis found that no matter which of the methods it used to calculate costs, private shipyards were less expensive, on average, than public shipyards for the most common type of overhaul for attack submarines. 2 CBO CBO’s analysis:  Focused on the most common type of overhaul, the Docking Selected Restricted Availability (DSRA), for SSN-688 class submarines;  Used data from the Navy’s Visibility and Management of Operating and Support Costs (VAMOSC) system for costs, days of labor, and days in shipyard; and  Adjusted for changes in accounting methods starting in 1999. Sources: Naval VAMOSC database, available at www.vamosc.navy.mil; National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2012, Section 832. 3 CBO CBO made comparisons of the following between public and private shipyards:  Unadjusted costs (as reported in the Navy’s data system),  Costs adjusted to include comparable overhead activities, and  Costs estimated using a model that accounts for differences in the age of the submarine and its maintenance plan as well as including comparable overhead. Those comparisons were made for various time periods. 4 CBO Comparisons of DSRA Overhauls of SSN-688s, 1993 to 2017 Public Private Shipyards Shipyards 26.1 20.9 Number of DSRA Overhauls b 117 29 Average Days in Shipyard 113 113 Unadjusted Average Cost (Millions of 2018 dollars) a Source: Congressional Budget Office, using data from the Navy’s Visibility and Management of Operating and Support Costs (VAMOSC) system. DSRA = Docking Selected Restricted Availability. a. These unadjusted results are biased in two ways: toward the private shipyards being less expensive because they did more overhauls in the early part of the sample period, when the submarines were newer and DSRAs were less expensive; and toward the public shipyards being less expensive because they did not report overhead costs in VAMOSC after their transition to mission funding starting in 1999. b. Five observations were dropped as incomplete, and 12 were corrected with additional information from the Navy Center for Cost Analysis or Naval Sea Systems Command. 5 CBO The Navy’s four shipyards began to switch from working capital funding (WCF) to mission funding in 1999 and stopped reporting overhead costs.  Under the WCF approach, the shipyards set the rates they charged on the basis of their planned workloads and to cover all of their expected costs for performing that work, including labor and overhead.  Under mission funding, direct appropriations authorize the Department of Defense to incur obligations for such designated purposes as ship maintenance or modifications. Source: Congressional Budget Office, Comparing Working Capital Funding and Mission Funding for Naval Shipyards (April 2007). 6 CBO Starting in 2007, CBO used data about overhead in mission-funded public shipyards reported in Navy justification books. From 1999 to 2006, CBO estimated those overhead costs to smoothly reflect the transition from working capital funding to mission funding. 7 CBO Overhead Costs as a Share of Total Costs at Public Shipyards Percent 60 Working Capital Funding (Reported in VAMOSC for each overhaul) Transitional Funding (CBO estimated and partially reported in VAMOSC) Mission Funding (Annual data for each public yard reported in Navy justification books) 50 40 30 20 10 0 Source: Congressional Budget Office, using data from VAMOSC and Department of the Navy, Budget Materials, Operation and Maintenance, Navy (OMN) Volume II Data Book, “Naval Shipyards” (February 2018 and previous years). VAMOSC = The Navy’s Visibility and Management of Operating and Support Costs system. 8 CBO CBO used its estimates during the period from 1999 to 2006 to adjust for missing or incomplete overhead costs in its analyses of total shipyard costs by decade. Source: Congressional Budget Office, Comparing Working Capital Funding and Mission Funding for Naval Shipyards (April 2007). 9 CBO Comparisons of Average DSRA Costs, Adjusted for Missing or Incomplete Overhead Costs Source: Congressional Budget Office, using data from VAMOSC and Department of the Navy, Budget Materials, Operation and Maintenance, Navy (OMN) Volume II Data Book, “Naval Shipyards” (February 2018 and previous years). DSRA = Docking Selected Restricted Availability; VAMOSC = The Navy’s Visibility and Management of Operating and Support Costs system; WFC = working capital funding. a. Some costs were reported under WCF, and some were reported under mission funding. 10 CBO After adjusting for missing or incomplete overhead costs, CBO found that the average costs at private shipyards were 38 percent lower than at public shipyards over the 1993–2017 period. CBO found that cost differences between public and private shipyards narrowed after 1999, but costs remained lower at private shipyards. 11 CBO Comparisons of DSRA Overhauls of SSN-688s 1990s 2000s 2010s 1993 to 2017 22.7 10.7 -53 39.2 33.2 -15 61.4 46.9 -24 33.6 20.9 -38 Number of DSRA Overhauls Public Shipyards Private Shipyards 57 17 47 10 13 2 117 29 Average Days in Shipyard Public Shipyards Private Shipyards 88 72 117 127 209 399 113 113 Adjusted Average Costa (Millions of 2018 dollars) Public Shipyards Private Shipyards Difference (Percent) Source: Congressional Budget Office, using data from VAMOSC and Department of the Navy, Budget Materials, Operation and Maintenance, Navy (OMN) Volume II Data Book, “Naval Shipyards” (February 2018 and previous years). DSRA = Docking Selected Restricted Availability. a. Costs are adjusted for missing or incomplete overhead costs. 12 CBO CBO also compared the costs of overhauls estimated using a model that accounts for differences in the age of the submarine and its maintenance plan as well as including comparable overhead. The results from that analysis were similar to those presented on the previous slide. 13 CBO The information in this document is preliminary and is being circulated to stimulate discussion and critical comment as developmental work for analysis for the Congress. Derek Trunkey composed this document, and Eric J. Labs provided assistance. Christine Bogusz edited the document, and Casey Labrack formatted it. An electronic version is available on CBO’s website (www.cbo.gov/publication/54444). 14