--- title: Why the Pentagon Can't Work Like a Business description: How waste skyrockets at the Pentagon, how to fix living organ donation, the future of the Arab Spring and more. canonical: https://time.com/4165944/pentagon-work-business/ author: TIME article:opinion: true article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2016-01-04T17:01:31.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-05-11T05:00:41.148Z article:section: Ideas og:title: Why the Pentagon Can't Work Like a Business og:description: These are today's best ideas og:url: https://time.com/4165944/pentagon-work-business/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: TIME og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Why the Pentagon Can't Work Like a Business twitter:description: These are today's best ideas twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- # Why the Pentagon Can't Work Like a Business by [The Aspen Institute](https://time.com/author/the-aspen-institute/) ## The Aspen Institute Jan 4, 2016 5:01 PM UTC by [The Aspen Institute](https://time.com/author/the-aspen-institute/) ## The Aspen Institute Jan 4, 2016 5:01 PM UTC **1\.** [**Here’s what happens when you try to run the Pentagon like a business. (It isn’t good.)**](http://www.politico.com/story/2015/12/pentagon-investigation-billions-broken-by-design-216935#ixzz3vcsiwotD) By Bryan Bender in Politico **2\.** [**How to fix living organ donation.**](https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/in-theory/wp/2016/01/01/its-time-to-treat-organ-donors-with-the-respect-they-deserve/) By Josh Morrison in the Washington Post **3\.** [**The story of the Arab Spring is far from over.**](http://america.aljazeera.com/opinions/2015/12/the-story-of-the-arab-spring-is-far-from-over.html) By Iyad El-Baghdadi in Al Jazeera America **4\.** [**In Silicon Valley, it’s now winner-take-all.**](http://www.newyorker.com/tech/elements/in-silicon-valley-now-its-almost-always-winner-takes-all) By Om Malik in the New Yorker **5\.** [**We’re on the brink of a banking revolution.**](http://graphics.wsj.com/image-grid/what-to-expect-in-2016/1665/walter-isaacson-on-the-coming-wave-of-fintech) By Walter Isaacson in the Wall Street Journal  [_The Aspen Institute_](http://www.aspeninstitute.org/) _is an educational and policy studies organization based in Washington, D.C._ ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"OpinionNewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4165944/pentagon-work-business/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4165944/pentagon-work-business/"},"headline":"Why the Pentagon Can't Work Like a Business","datePublished":"2016-01-04T17:01:31.000Z","dateModified":"2026-05-11T05:00:41.148Z","description":"These are today's best ideas","url":"https://time.com/4165944/pentagon-work-business/","keywords":["Innovation","Bitcoin","Pentagon","Arab Spring","Silicon Valley"],"thumbnailUrl":"","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"The Aspen Institute","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/the-aspen-institute/"}],"articleSection":"Ideas","image":[],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/ideas/","name":"Ideas"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/innovation/","name":"Innovation"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4165944/pentagon-work-business/","name":"Why the Pentagon Can't Work Like a Business"}}]}] ```