>
> Which brings to mind another question which might be asked:
>
>        Assuming our personnel selection is imperfect, what are the
>         statistics regarding our likelihood of getting competent
>         software engineers if we choose only those experienced
>         in C vs only those experienced in Ada.
>
I've taught both Ada and C.
I program in both Ada and C.
When I program in C, I spend twice as much effort, and still
(in my opinion) write unreliable code.
When I teach Ada, I teach software Engineering.
When I teach Software Engineering, I teach about Ada, because
 it has the software enginnering conecpts I think should be taught.
When I teach C, I am not able to teach Software Engineering very well.
When I teach Software Engineering, I find those who have studied Ada find
  the  course very easy; they can concentrte of process and configuration
  management and defect tracking and metrics and ...
When I teach Software Engineer, I find that those who have studied only
  languages in the C family (or no languages at all) find the course hard.
They've been so close to the nitty-gritty that they have a hard time
  coming up to the concepts.

Just my thoughts.
  ..Paul