Augustine's laws were a series of tongue in cheek aphorisms put forth by Norman Ralph Augustine

Norman Ralph Augustine

Norman Ralph Augustine is a U.S. aerospace businessman who served as Under Secretary of the Army from 1975-77. Augustine currently serves as chairman of the Review of United States Human Space Flight Plans Committee.-Career:...

, an American aerospace

Aerospace

Aerospace comprises the atmosphere of Earth and surrounding space. Typically the term is used to refer to the industry that researches, designs, manufactures, operates, and maintains vehicles moving through air and space...

 businessman who served as Under Secretary of the Army from 1975 to 1977. In 1984 he published his laws.

Law 16

His most cited law is number 16, which shows that defense budgets grow linearly but the unit cost

Unit cost

The unit cost of a product is the cost per standard unit supplied, which may be a single sample or a container of a given number. When purchasing more than a single unit, the total cost will increase with the number of units, but it is common for the unit cost to decrease as quantity is increased...

 of a new military aircraft grows exponentially

Exponential growth

Exponential growth occurs when the growth rate of a mathematical function is proportional to the function's current value...

:

In the year 2054, the entire defence budget will purchase just one aircraft. This aircraft will have to be shared by the Air Force and Navy 3½ days each per week except for leap year, when it will be made available to the Marines for the extra day."