House Sea Power Subcommittee hearing flags major delays, workforce shortfalls in U.S. shipbuilding

WASHINGTON — Lawmakers and technical witnesses at a House Armed Services Committee Sea Power and Projection Forces Subcommittee hearing said Thursday that the United States is behind schedule and paying more than planned to build and repair Navy ships, and they urged a combination of workforce investments, industrial-base modernization and procurement reforms to close the gap.

Committee members and the panel’s witnesses — officials from the Department of the Navy, the Congressional Budget Office, the Government Accountability Office and the Congressional Research Service — described sustained cost growth, delivery delays across major ship programs and a shortage of skilled trades and designers that industry and government must confront to meet the Navy’s force requirements.

Why it matters: The Navy’s latest assessments call for a fleet of roughly 381 battle force ships; witnesses told the subcommittee that current procurement plans and industrial capacity would not meet that target on the timeframes the Navy has described unless systemic changes occur. The panel repeatedly identified workforce pay, retention and training as central constraints and urged steadier, production‑focused procurement to give industry clearer demand signals.

The hearing opened with Chairman Kelly saying the United States “cannot fulfill our historical role in the maritime domain without our surface ship and submarine fleet,” and noting reliance on recent GAO and CBO reporting to frame the problems. Dr. Brett Seidel, acting assistant secretary of the Navy for research, development and acquisition, told the committee that U.S. shipbuilders still produce high‑quality warships but that “cost and schedule performance remain challenged, with deliveries approximately 1 to 3 years late and costs rising faster than overall inflation.”

Dr. Eric Labs of the Congressional Budget Office highlighted the scale of cost growth and demand on the yards. He told the panel that cost overruns for 46 ships then under construction “grew threefold” over the last budget year, from about $3.4 billion to $10.4 billion, and summarized a CBO estimate that meeting the Navy’s procurement plan would require roughly $40 billion per year for many years — far above recent appropriations. Labs emphasized that labor shortages and increased tonnage under construction have lengthened build times and driven cost growth.

Shelby Oakley of the Government Accountability Office said GAO’s multi‑year examinations show recurring causes of poor outcomes: unstable designs entered into construction, optimistic business cases that do not reflect realistic schedule or capacity constraints, and insufficient Navy processes to measure whether industrial‑base investments are producing results. “Marginal change will not fix the persistently poor outcomes,” Oakley said, urging stable design maturity before bending metal and the development of outcome‑based metrics for industrial base investments.

Ronald O’Rourke of the Congressional Research Service urged production‑centered planning. He outlined options discussed in his testimony — federated shipbuilding, a kit‑of‑parts approach, design for producibility, continuous production and multiyear contracting where cost‑effective — and said these changes would help reduce labor hours and smooth workload at yards and suppliers.

On workforce, committee members and witnesses converged on pay and retention as immediate priorities. Representative Joe Courtney and others pointed to historic declines in manufacturing employment and argued that wages, benefits and quality‑of‑life factors must improve to attract and keep welders, pipefitters and other trades. “If you…paid these workers more…they would absolutely show up in droves,” Dr. Labs said, calling the workforce problem the key constraint on other fixes.

Witnesses and members also discussed supply‑chain bottlenecks such as forgings and specialty components, the interdependence of Columbia and Virginia class submarine production, and the need for better integration of ship repair and new construction workforces. Several members raised the possibility of greater use of allied shipbuilders for non‑combat sealift or support vessels as one lever to relieve domestic capacity constraints, while witnesses warned of tradeoffs and urged careful policy choices.

The session produced no formal votes. Lawmakers repeatedly urged using the committee’s oversight tools, continued GAO and CBO scrutiny, and White House and Pentagon initiatives — including a White House shipbuilding office mentioned at the hearing — to press for the changes witnesses recommended. The hearing record includes multiple recommendations for Congress and the Navy to prioritize labor incentives, design maturity before construction, steadier procurement rates and clearer metrics for industrial base investments.