Given how nothing stays secret for long these days - I cant see how Lewis /Paddy signings are connected in the slightest.
The time between Lewis signing and even the rumour starting that Paddy may leave McLaren / join Merc was several months.
Surely there is more evidence to suggest McLaren can and Merc cant - even after three seasons Merc has only won one single race out of nigh on 60.
For right or wrong, Lewis moved because he thought he could beat Rosberg hands down and get the undisputed No1 seat that he wasnt given at McLaren.
No one can say anything about 2014 onwards apart from it being a possibility for advantage Merc - even taking McLaren (due to the same engine) out of the equation, its still far more likely that RBR and Ferrari will be ahead next season
Firstly, things stay secret all the time, only the things you hear about didn't stay a secret, the ones that did, you haven't heard about. As for the rest, lol, Lewis moved to a "worse" team just to be number one... only because in your opinion he wasn't already, most people regard that differently. He moved because with the best car Mclaren still failed him miserably. Button didn't do enough to win the title last year, Hamilton did, there is a clear number one, and any other team with that car and Hamilton would have won the title and probably should have won the constructors. No other driver came remotely close to self inflicted damage as Mclaren did to Hamilton. Busted cars, lack of fuel in quali, crap pit stops and bad tactics.
There isn't any point being at the team with the best car if they still can't win. As for why Merc might compete now but not for the past three years, well, some comparisons of budgets.. ballpark, I don't think any are massively accurate but the general order of things seems to be agreed by most sources.
In 2008 Toyota, Mclaren, Ferrari were between $450-400, Honda and Renault were just under $400, RBR were at $170mil.
2009 Brawn were down at £100million, Mclaren were spending £310million in the same year, Toyota were down to £260mil and Ferrari were at £240mil(this one I don't really believe as many say besides Toyota Ferrari have spent similarly mental amounts since 2008).
Honda to Brawn meant the team dropped down massively in spending from within 10% of Mclaren, to spending 33% of what Mclaren were spending, and a HUGE amount of spending means teams developing next years cars, in year development, losing huge numbers of staff, testing facilities, everything. They had a lot of the spending done on that Brawn, but then the money was gone. The average team spend was £170mil that year, which should give a good indication of exactly how low Brawn's budget fell., can't find Red Bull spending but I'm under the impression it was fairly damn low.
2011
1] Ferrari: €440m (Same budget since 2008, 2012 will see it go down to €300m)
2] McLaren: €320m (Down €5m on 2010, 2012 will see it go down to €285m)
3] Red Bull: €285m (up €40m on 2010, will stay same for 2012)
4] Mercedes: €225m (up €40m on 2010, will stay same for 2012)
5] Renault: €185m (down €40m on 2010, uncertain for 2012)
6] Williams: €140m (down €40m on 2010, will stay same for 2012)
7] Force India: €135m (up €10m on 2010, will drop to €130m for 2012)
8] Sauber: €125m (up from €75m in 2010, will stay same in 2012)
=] Toro Rosso: €125m (up €15m from 2010, will increase to €140m in 2012)
10] Team Lotus: €120m (€20m up on 2010, however 2012 will see this riase to a minimum of €150m)
11] Virgin: €66m (up from €45m in 2010, this is expected to rise to €85m for 2012)
12] Hispania: €55m (up from a €38.6m budget, expected to rise to a budget of arround €65m to €70m in 2012)
Red Bull have been steadily increasing their spending as they've been successful, Ferrari have always spent daft amounts(largely on HUGE salaries).
2012
Red Bull-Renault = €265m - €380m Adjusted
McLaren-Mercedes = €250m
Scuderia Ferrari = €310m
Mercedes AMG F1 = €200m
Lotus-Renault = €160-180
Force India-Mercedes = €125m
Sauber-Ferrari = €85m
Toro Rosso-Ferrari = €115m
Williams-Renault = €115m
Caterham-Renault = €105m
HRT-Cosworth = €50m
Marussia-Cosworth = €70m
Adjusted there is the budget added with their secondary teams
The biggest problem Merc had is the massive drop in spending in 2009, which was a crucial year the current cars are essentially 2010 cars, the year before which Merc had about 17p spare to design that car, so they've been on the back foot since the relatively current car has been around.
Lotus have spent less than Merc and made a pretty decent damn car for the money, but the other key thing really is that Merc had to just rip the team to pieces due to lack of money in 2009, while other teams reduced spending a bit at a time, cutting back, reducing wages of drivers, everyone involved really. The difference between a planned scaling back and gutting the team completely then rebuilding from scratch is just not comparable.
Essentially long term Merc will be spending similar amounts while having mechanics, testing, design teams all having worked together for at least a couple of years while not being vastly outspent by those above them.
There is no spend X amount get place Y, but spending 1/3 of what the top guys were, no chance of being competitive, the entire lack of money in 2009 wiped out the cars chance for 2010/2011, and they spent much of that time rebuilding the team, looking closer(but not there at all) last year. This would be the first season they have a remotely comparable budget and being fully staffed up for the year previous.
