Something New or Not, 'cause we dont pay attention!

[Robert Thomas]

A little under 3 million civil service employees.



1.2 million in support of Defense Department - National Guard, Base Support, Security



.4 400 thousand Veterans Affairs - Hospital staff, Physic ans



1.3 million Executive Branch - Homeland, Justice, Treasury, Interior, etc.



.1 100,000 Non Executive Branch Employees



So if you don't cut Defense or Veterans Affairs you are left with 1 million 400 thousand employees to pull your cuts from. Average salary is around 70,000. Cutting 50% of these employees results in 700,000 layoffs. 80% of this workforce (560,000 are eligible for early retirement benefits). Figure 50% of the individuals getting retirement benefits would get job in the private sector. Resulting in 280,000 additional individuals on unemployment. 20% of the workforce 140.000 would now be eligible for benefits and would go directly on unemployment.



End result is that the Executive Branch shuts down, you are now paying 700,000 individuals to do nothing, and your SS benefits are now 1 Trillion +++.

 

[Richard L]

Redfish,

I am talking about not cutting active military positions....Only civilian positions



Yes, some would be eligiblefor early retirement, as they would be in the corporate world and would be receiving even higher pensions if they were to stay on the payroll longer. This is the same strategy that most businesses use when they need to cut spending and dig in for hard times.....Cutting the staff is the quickest, most effective way to reduce operating costs. The only difference is that most cuts are made at the lowest levels where the pay is smaller and impacts their ability to get the job done. That's why I said that at least half the cuts should involve employees who make over $100K a year....That will have the biggest implact on reducing costs.



The executive branch will not shut down...That is always the threat of of the government when they are called out about their Pork barrel projects, budget increases and deficit spending. Any agency director who can't do the job with 5% less employees, needs to be relieved of his job as well!



If Social Security needs money, the can raise the SS payroll taxes....It really should not have any bearing on the US Budget, since the SS is supposed to be paid for by employee and employer contributions. As for Medicare, that was started by Pres. Johnson back in 1966 and that is also paid for by Employee and Employer contributions. Most of the current porblems with them is that nobody calculated out what the cost would be 40, 50 or 60 years later.



SS and Medicare has been a pawn in the politician's bag of tricks for at least 50 years. They made the committment to pay it, and now it is costing them more than they thought it should. They can still change SS and Medicare for those in the future, but they cannot default on those Americans who paid into the system and now expect that promise to be kept.



The problem we have to many people in government who look at the problem the same way you do...It sounds like you work for the government, or did in the past. :grin: They think the system has become so bureacratic that there is nothing that can be done about it...so just leave it as it is?? I say, if you don't do anything about, then of course nothing will change. If we want change we cannot sit back and wait for others to impliment that change. We will have to put forth the effort if only to badger our leadership that we want to see change, and we are tired of their excuses.



Remember: "If you always do what you always did, you will always get, what you always got".



I think if you cut every agency's staff by 5% the people who have leadership skills will find innovative ways to get the job done with less. It's easy to just sit back and tell everyone you need more money, but if you don't get that money, you find ways to survive.



When I say 50% cuts in 10 years, does not mean that every department and agency will blindly be cut. I know some agency's that could not survive without more employees, but most would not have any major impact for the first few rounds of cuts. At least it will force them to look at their staff and design better ways to streamline their operations to get the job done with less people and plan for the future year with less people. If the employees and the management are never challenged, they will never change.



...Rich

 

[Robert Thomas]

Richard,



I can't follow. Cut employees 75%. Cut employees 50%. Cut budget certain percentage. Then finely 5% per year for 10 years to get to 50%. Math doesn't work on that one. Now "does not mean that every department and agency will blindly be cutsome agencies will be cut more that others" and "I know some agency's that could not survive without more employees, but most would not have any major impact for the first few rounds of cuts"



The savings just aren't there.

The problem we have to many people in government who look at the problem the same way you do... They think the system has become so bureacratic that there is nothing that can be done about it...

It usually gets down to this. It's where I stop. I gave a way to accomplish major cutbacks in personnel and funding.

 

[Richard L]

Redfish,

It usually gets down to this. It's where I stop. I gave a way to accomplish major cutbacks in personnel and funding.

Not sure what you mean by that statement???



Also, You never answered my question as to if you work/worked for the government or not?? But it sure sounds like you do, or did.



Anyway, I was being facecious about cutting employees by 75%....but in the way long term that may be possible....but we need to take baby steps first and they need to be in the right direction.



Cutting staffs by 50% can be accomplished by reducing staff 5% every year over a 10 year period...that is actually more than 50% but I never said that there would never be any exceptions...and those exceptions may change from year to year. If we are involved in future wars we may need to keep or even hire more people for the DOD. If we have a lot of Hurricanes and other natural disasters, we may need to hang on to more FEMA employees. We just need to be flexable. That's how many well oiled businesses operate. They do a lot of temporary hiring for special projects or occasional heavy work-loads. Just because the government is supposed to be a non-profit entity, does not mean they cannot learn a few things from the more profitable corporations.



The bigger the company/corporation gets the more they lose control of their budget and their money and have no idea of what is going on down at the lower levels.... That also aplies to the US Governement, and even the individual states.



Many years ago, I heard the late Paul Harvey state this simple fact.... If we eliminated all the bureacracy from all the City, State, and Federal welfare system, we have enough money that we could afford to pay every man, woman and child on welfare a tax free salary of $70K a year. We are paying way too much money for people to do "stubby pencil" work that is already automated....but we do this just to give these people jobs.

In general, the art of government consists of taking as much money as possible from one party of the citizens to give to the other.

-Voltaire (1764)

The government is like a baby's alimentary canal, with a happy appetite at one end and no responsibility at the other.

-Ronald Reagan

Government is the great fiction, through which everybody endeavors to live at the expense of everybody else.

-Frederic Bastiat, Economist (1801-1850)

...Rich

 

[Robert Thomas]

Richard,



I, for a number of reasons having noting to do with this forum, don't want to post what I did on a public forum. Presently, I have a home based Tennis Racquet Stringing Business. (Any referrals would be appreciated)



I can assure you that what I did has nothing to do with my statements in this post.



I have no interest in protecting the downright wasteful bureaucracy know as the federal government and/or any agency employees.



I am interested in paying off the federal debt and having the government then, have a balanced budget.

If we have a lot of Hurricanes and other natural disasters, we may need to hang on to more FEMA employees

Odd that you would want to hang on to these employees.

FEMA is one of the most useless, wasteful, political, and stupid agencies in the Federal Bureaucracy. - Redfish (1946 - ?)

 

[Richard L]

Redfish,

Sorry, I did not mean to pry.



As for FEMA, I agree, but if we were trying to recover from a disaster when the lay offs were due, I could understand the need for more employees.



I agree that FEMA is mostly useless, and wastefull, and very poorly managed, but until we get something better to replace them, we are pretty much stuck with them. The same applies to many other agencies like the Department of Energy...:grin:



My whole point was that we all know these wastes are going on, and the government keep growing and growing out of control. Every President promises to change Washington, and make people accountable for all the waste, yet nothing ever happens because they cannot do it alone. They all seem to have a pet project they want to get passed like Health Care, and that's all they can focus on.



We need a top down restructuring of the American Government and it will take a very heavy axe to cut away all the dead wood.



...Rich

 

[Kevin Lang]

We could axe the Department of Education right now. It does nothing worth doing, and we've only gone downhill since it was implemented, as far as I can see.



As for the Dept of Energy, Chu needs to get his behind in gear and build some more nuclear plants, or at least let existing ones expand. If the government is going to unilaterally force issues on us, I'd rather it be something useful like nuclear power than something short-sighted and useless like our national healthcare, such as it is. My state could use the money of the fabled 3rd reactor at Calvert Cliffs Nuclear Power Plant.