You Gotta Be Kidding Me!

Today I will discuss two government operations, one Federal and one local, that blew my mind, talk about wasting money. First case: according to a June, 2009 AP report by reporter June Matthews, New York City operates a series of "rubber rooms" under their department of education. If any employee of the NYC school system is accused of any type of wrongdoing, they are assigned to a specific rubber room where they have to report every day until their case is settled. While in this limbo state, accused but not settled, these employees receive their full pay and benefits and get the same vacation schedule of regular, non-accused employees and teachers.

Here's the kicker: many of these people are in these rubber rooms for months at a time and some of these people are in them for YEARS with Ms. Matthews identifying some people that have been going to them, drawing full salary and benefits, for five and six years. Currently, there are over seven hundred employees waiting for their case to be heard which is costing the city of New York about $65 million a year, money that is spent but does nothing to educate. The department of education blames the union and its rules (fair enough) while the union wants due process to prevail for its accused members (fair enough). Seems like the root cause of the problem lies in the fact that there are only 23 arbitrators who work only five days a month. Note to the New York City political class: wouldn't it be a good idea to hire some more arbitrators, if even for a short time, to clear the backlog and save tens of millions of dollars a year?

Second case: According to an article by Gregg Carlstrom writing for the website, www. federaltimes.com, on September 7, 2009, the Post Office has seen about a 13% drop in mail volume this year, significantly reducing revenue and causing an expected red ink amount of $7 billion in 2009. However, Mr. Carlstrom reports that on any day of the week, the Post Office sends thousands of employees to so-called "standby rooms" to sit and wait for something to do. While in the rooms, employees are not allowed to do anything but sit and wait: no card playing, no portable electronic devices, no PCs, nothing. Sometimes employees are in their for a few hours and sometimes they are in there for full days. Talk about a waste of time and life. The article estimates that standby room time is costing the Post Office about $50 million a year. Unfortunately, according to union guidelines, these excess human resources cannot be fired due to the lack of work for them and cannot currently be reassigned to near by facilities where there is work to be done. Note to the federal branch of the political class: there are many widely accepted ways to more efficiently handle a variable work load, i.e. have a variable workforce in order to maximize your staff dollars. Most any college freshman business major could set a process up for you.

Think about the above: in just two instances we could have saved the American taxpayer over $100 million a year with just a little common sense. Why have the political class at all levels not done this? I do not know if it is lack of ability, lack of brain power, or focusing on other things like how to pass a bill to mandate the sound volume on TV advertising (see the post from a few days ago). That is why one of the major suggestions in the book, "Love My Country, Loathe My Government," is to basically start over relative to all government programs. Put everything through the wringer and ask a few simple questions:

• Is this program vital to a large number of citizens? If not, kill it now.
• If this program is vital, are their parts of it that can be eliminated, downsized, or made more efficient?
• Can comparable programs in two of more government areas be combined to improve service while decreasing costs?

If we can easily find $100 million of waste in just a few minutes of Internet searching, imagine how many billions of dollars of waste that are out there and whose savings could be returned to other taxpayer.