Fat and Overlap

The Government Accountability Office is constantly studying and analyzing the cost of the federal government, issuing reports and providing testimony before various Congressional committees on the relevant financial subjects they cover. For the second year, they have issued their analysis of overlap and duplication in federal services. Their report (“More Efficient and Effective Government: Opportunities to Reduce Duplication, Overlap and Fragmentation, Achieve Savings, and Enhance Revenue” whew!) is tough and slow reading and their testimony on the subject before a House committee was sparsely attended, thought by some to be a cross between looking at paint drying or watching grass growing.

But one intrepid reporter at the Washington Post (March 15^th), Joe Davidson, thought they had some very good ideas, probably resulting in vastly greater savings than freezing federal pay levels (the latter which program pretty much guarantees that unless you were born rich, the best and the brightest will eventually leave for the private sector leaving… guess who… behind). Davidson’s extracts from the report are verrrrry interesting:

 There were “20 different entities that administer 160 programs, tax expenditures, and other tools that supported homeownership and rental housing in fiscal year 2010.”

 Duplication of Defense Department and Veterans Affairs health-care programs has led to “inadequate information exchange and poor coordination between these programs” and “confusion and frustration for enrollees, particularly when case managers and care coordinators duplicate or contradict one another’s efforts.”

 The Navy “plans to spend more than $3 billion to develop the Broad Area Maritime Surveillance UAS [unmanned aircraft systems] rather than the already fielded Air Force Global Hawk system on which it was based.”

 Promotion of science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) education has produced 209 programs in 13 agencies. Eighty-three percent of the programs “overlapped to some degree with at least 1 other program in that they offered similar services to target groups . . . to achieve similar objectives.”

Obviously, this is just the tip of the iceberg, but government waste has been a bi-partisan song that we have been hearing for years. “The 2012 report identifies 51 areas ‘that could either reduce the cost of government operations or enhance revenue collections for the Treasury,’ Comptroller General Gene L. Dodaro said in his Feb. 28 testimony to the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee.” The Post. And it seemed that bi-partisan support could actually implement many of the recommendations.

One bold Congressman who testified before the committee asked the right question: “‘Who is to blame for this maze of government programs?’ asked Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) in his testimony. ‘Very simply, it is Congress. We are all culpable. And to be sure, the blame does not rest on one party or the other, it lies with both. Duplication in this country has been created by the ruling class of career politicians seeking to slap short-term fixes on problems in order to claim credit at home and recognition in Washington.’” The Post.

But another laid down the party line that pretty much stops any progress as some in Congress have only one goal: to bring down the Obama administration by blocking all meaningful legislation unless it is desperately necessary: “Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), chairman of the committee, injected a lonely note of partisan discord into the hearing when he said Obama’s ‘request for reorganizational authority is dead on arrival in this committee unless the administration is willing to be much bigger in their thought.’” The Post. Can’t we move the election up… to next week?

I’m Peter Dekom, and in a time of financial crisis, you’d like to think that our Congress can rise above pettiness and govern the nation in the best interests of the people… you’d think!