What costs can be cut from the US federal govt without eliminating services?

[sixwings]

This piece is about the impact of major cost cutting on Trump country:

Budget overhaul could cut deep in Trump country
By Andy Sullivan and Ally J. Levine
Published Dec. 11, 2024

President-elect Donald Trump has tasked billionaire Elon Musk and former presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy with finding deep cuts to the $6.2 trillion U.S. federal budget. It may not be easy: the two are likely to discover that any substantial reductions would have a deep impact across the country, especially in the states that voted to return Trump to the White House.


https://www.reuters.com/graphics/USA-TRUMP/BUDGET/xmvjbqgmkvr/?lctg=63f53ca6fb5bf83d07046add

Here's the phrase that gets me:  "... likely to discover ..."

How do you campaign on a policy and then only "discover" after the election what the likely outcome will be? 

I'm expecting that Trump v.2 will backpedal hard on this, or, if they forge ahead, that maybe, just maybe, their supporters will finally wake up.

or he continues to blow up the deficit and raiding government programs for his and his rich friends benefit while talking about being tough on spending publicly and conservatives are too stupid and stuck up his ass to know any better.

[Financial.Velociraptor]

For anyone interested in what I am talking about, here is a short video explaining modern monetary theory (MMT) as well as a link to a PDF.

There are no ifs or buts, this is how it works and most other takes on macroeconomics, particularly from the right wing nutter faction, are simply fantasies and utter nonsense when it comes to how a fiat currency works:

What is modern monetary theory
Richard J Murphy

You can’t discuss macroeconomics without knowing about modern monetary theory. So, what is it all about? In this longer-than-usual video I offer my explanation. You won’t regret finding out.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1_vNAY2Nrm0

Modern monetary theory: an explanation
Professor Richard Murphy
April 2023

Modern monetary theory (hereafter, MMT) is an explanation of the way in which money works in an economy.
It also explains the consequent impact that the best use of money, using this understanding, might have on behaviour in that economy.

The core suggestion made by MMT is that a government is constrained by the real productive capacity of its economy and not by the availability of money, which it can always create.

Secondary insights are that money is created by government spending and is destroyed by taxation.

https://www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/Modern-monetary-theory-v2.pdf

I did my undergrad in Economics and completed in 1998.  MMT was a very new and very controversial idea at the time that I roundly rejected and clung to the Monetarist theories of Friedman. 

I watched with bewilderment as Mosler, formerly a not particularly well known bond trader, made a ton of money with his MMT making bets for himself and his investors that looked like suicide to a Monetarist.  And he did it with sleepy sovereign debt! 

I've come to accept that at least some of MMT is valid.  I don't accept 100% of the findings (yet) but moved strongly in that direction as I watched the things the model predicts come true with COVID and the subsequent stimulus while the things modeled by the Monetarists just plain didn't happen.  Correlation is not causation but I damn well can see when a large number of conforming data points start to establish a "trend line".  Can recommend Mosler's book. 

Note: there are some left leaning ideologues, that misinterpret MMT to mean that the government can and even should print as much money as possible.  Mosler does not intend that AT ALL and it would certainly be inflationary (including per the MMT model).  We can print one hell of a lot more money than the Monetarists estimate however.  And this can be leveraged if the new money is spent on productive purposes, especially infrastructure spending.   

[PeteD01]

...

Note: there are some left leaning ideologues, that misinterpret MMT to mean that the government can and even should print as much money as possible.  Mosler does not intend that AT ALL and it would certainly be inflationary (including per the MMT model).  We can print one hell of a lot more money than the Monetarists estimate however.  And this can be leveraged if the new money is spent on productive purposes, especially infrastructure spending.

Right, and that's why the DOGE project is a dangerous folly - but hey, if the objective is to crash the economy and plunge the country into misery, go right ahead.
In any case, what else is to be expected with Musk, Ramaswamy and Marjorie Taylor Greene in charge.

From the PDF:


There is a widespread political obsession with controlling the level of government debt within economies. Although fiat currencies effectively disappeared throughout the world after the USA abandoned the gold standard in 1971 there remains an apparent feeling that all government debt is created by borrowing and that the debt in question must be repaid because it only exists by depriving the private sector economy of the capital that it needs to fund productive economic activity. MMT shatters the myths underpinning these claims in five ways.

Firstly, MMT makes clear, as the previous section explains, that the only borrowing that a government need undertake when financing its activities is from its central bank.

Second, as the previous section again explains, MMT makes clear that what is now called ‘the national debt’ is in fact the money supply created by the government.
Third, as again should be clear from the previous section, the supposed ‘borrowing’ by the government is no such thing: it is actually banking activity.

Fourth, and perhaps most importantly, what MMT makes clear is that ‘balancing the books’ makes no sense. In a growing economy with modest inflation there will be a need for a continually growing money supply. That means that not all the new money that the government creates through its spending into the economy needs to be, or should be, withdrawn from use in that economy. Growth will require that there be more money in use and it is the job of the government as curator of the currency to supply that money. The only way that it can do that is by running deficits i.e. by spending more than it taxes. There is, then, no need for tax revenues to match government spending. There is, instead, very good reason why they should not.

https://www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/Modern-monetary-theory-v2.pdf

[GuitarStv]

Counterpoint - a cryptobro told me that fiat is bad because only a deflationary currency that nobody has ever really used for anything other than destroying the planet is the way of the future.


So . . . checkmate.

[PeteD01]

Counterpoint - a cryptobro told me that fiat is bad because only a deflationary currency that nobody has ever really used for anything other than destroying the planet is the way of the future.


So . . . checkmate.

Fools they are.

I did miss an error in the source I quoted though, sorry about the confusion it may have caused:

Although non-fiat fiat currencies effectively disappeared throughout the world after the USA abandoned the gold standard in 1971 there remains an apparent feeling that all government debt is created by borrowing and that the debt in question must be repaid because it only exists by depriving the private sector economy of the capital that it needs to fund productive economic activity. MMT shatters the myths underpinning these claims in five ways.

[Fomerly known as something]

Well and nots forget making up alternative facts.

Sen Joni Ernst Recently said only 6% of federal employees go into the office, but close to 50% of federal employees are ineligible for telework (or remote work).  I’ll admit I was in the office for less than a week in October, I also only slept in my bed for 7 days that month.  I was not on any sort of leave.  So I wasn’t working from the office but I sure as heck wasn’t working from home. 

[Ron Scott]

I have to smile at the infatuation some people have with MMT—“Modern Monetary Theory”, which is certainly not modern, is argued with as many fiscal goals as monetary ones, and is less a theory than a simple explanation of government accounting practices.

Here’s the thing: While it is obviously true the US government has no need to raise money through taxation or bond issuance to “spend” as it wishes, the volume of money in the economy needs to be on par with the availability of goods and services or prices will increase naturally to force a balance (inflation).

And keep in mind the fact that both liberals and conservatives have played this game for many decades. A liberal government can “spend” money on social programs to the breaking point, but conservatives can enact significant tax cuts that have the same monetary effect—and then claim the social programs are “too expensive”.  It’s all the same shit…

I just wish the few politicians who actually understand all this would stop the obfuscation and focus on the real opportunity of growing productivity. Productivity growth is the best tool to defeat inflation in the left-vs.-right contest.

[PeteD01]

I have to smile at the infatuation some people have with MMT—“Modern Monetary Theory”, which is certainly not modern, is argued with as many fiscal goals as monetary ones, and is less a theory than a simple explanation of government accounting practices.

...

Right, no voodoo economics or PhD required.

[PeteD01]

...

Here’s the thing: While it is obviously true the US government has no need to raise money through taxation or bond issuance to “spend” as it wishes, the volume of money in the economy needs to be on par with the availability of goods and services or prices will increase naturally to force a balance (inflation).

...

And yet, there are still a lot of fools who continue to equate government operations with households/businesses and draw harebrained conclusions from this false premise, while a simple assessment of government accounting and the nature of government debt leads to straightforward explanations.

[Ron Scott]

I have to smile at the infatuation some people have with MMT—“Modern Monetary Theory”, which is certainly not modern, is argued with as many fiscal goals as monetary ones, and is less a theory than a simple explanation of government accounting practices.

Here’s the thing: While it is obviously true the US government has no need to raise money through taxation or bond issuance to “spend” as it wishes, the volume of money in the economy needs to be on par with the availability of goods and services or prices will increase naturally to force a balance (inflation).

And keep in mind the fact that both liberals and conservatives have played this game for many decades. A liberal government can “spend” money on social programs to the breaking point, but conservatives can enact significant tax cuts that have the same monetary effect—and then claim the social programs are “too expensive”.  It’s all the same shit…

I just wish the few politicians who actually understand all this would stop the obfuscation and focus on the real opportunity of growing productivity. Productivity growth is the best tool to defeat inflation in the left-vs.-right contest.

Right, no voodoo economics or PhD required.

Further reading for MMT enthusiasts:

[Telecaster]

We can print one hell of a lot more money than the Monetarists estimate however.  And this can be leveraged if the new money is spent on productive purposes, especially infrastructure spending.

I just wish the few politicians who actually understand all this would stop the obfuscation and focus on the real opportunity of growing productivity. Productivity growth is the best tool to defeat inflation in the left-vs.-right contest.

Spending money on productive purposes does increase productivity.   

[Scandium]

I think the best part about this idiotic DOGE.. thing? Is that it's promoting efficiency, by starting, from scratch, another version of an organization that already exists: the Congressional Budget Office! And that it has two leaders! Seems like the first recommendation should be to reduce the top level headcount at DOGE by 50%, then shut itself down do reduce waste on duplicated efforts!

[NorCal]

I think the best part about this idiotic DOGE.. thing? Is that it's promoting efficiency, by starting, from scratch, another version of an organization that already exists: the Congressional Budget Office! And that it has two leaders! Seems like the first recommendation should be to reduce the top level headcount at DOGE by 50%, then shut itself down do reduce waste on duplicated efforts!

It does promise to be comically ineffective.  The amount of spending that can be controlled by the executive branch isn't $0, but it's not massive either.  While I'm sure the DOGE bros will push the bounds of legality, I don't suspect they will fundamentally alter the balance of power between the executive and legislative branches.  So far their big idea is a return to office mandate.

Which means their proposals have to go through Congress.  So let's look at the state of Congress.

The makeup of the House & Senate is a little different next year, but not massively so.  There's no majority big enough to push through major legislation.  Just this week the Republican "majority" had to cut a bipartisan deal with $10B in farm aid and $100B in disaster aid just to keep the government from shutting down.

The idea that the next Congress is going to pass major legislation in a way that negatively impacts vested interests in most Congressional districts is simply comical.  The next Congress will be barely able to keep the basic operations of government going, much less pass major budget cuts. 

They might figure something out when they realize that many of Trump's prior tax cuts expire at the end of 2025.  But given the size of the tax package needed, this is probably going to be a bipartisan bill instead of a party-line bill. 

[zolotiyeruki]

Here are a couple thoughts on my part:
1) It's important to recognize that the whole "efficiency" thing isn't just about whacking whole departments, it's about cutting out the bloat within departments.  It's also about eliminating politically-motivated procurement requirements or incentives that drive costs higher, e.g. preferences for minority- or woman- or veteran-owned vendors.  I would argue that anything DEI-related (like this or this or this or this, at salaries nearing $200k/year(!)) needs to go.  At best, it's a waste of money IMO, and at worst, it actively destroys productivity and morale.  The lions share of anything social-media or PR-related can likely go as well.  Use-it-or-lose-it budgets need to go away.  Procurement needs to be streamlined.  How many hundreds of billions of dollars were wasted or defrauded during the pandemic?

2) What departments or major spending should go?  Definitely Education is a valid target.  You're going to have to work really hard to convince me of the net benefit of the federal DoE.  They take tax dollars in, dole taxpayer dollars out, and employ a bunch of people in the process.  Taxpayer-subsidized student loans are definitely on the menu.  They subsidize college attendance, not graduation or marketable skills or knowledge, and have contributed to the tremendous inflation in college costs over the past 50 years.  Housing can go, as can much of Transportation.  The fact that my town of 30,000 residents is waiting for a federal handout to widen a local road is just stupid.  The management of roads needs to be pushed to more local levels of government.  Department of Labor, too.

3) The military is a bit of a mess.  Too much brass, too many pet projects, too much bureaucracy in procurement.  Too many cooks in the kitchen, too many pie-in-the-sky dreams driving unreasonable requirements.  A friend who worked on a particular fighter jet told me that there was a senator who wanted his rather petite granddaughter to be able to fly a new fighter design.  The cost to re-engineer just one of the fighter's systems to accommodate her physiology was in the eight figures.  The process of procuring an existing, off-the-shelf product is stupidly complex--one part of the organization says they want it, another has to write up requirements saying "we need a device that does X, Y, and Z," a third department then takes those requirements and then looks around to see if such a widget exists, a fourth department controls the money, and a fifth has to do the approvals, and nobody wants to stick their neck out.

All that said, US military spending is near its lowest level, as a share of GDP, in nearly a century.  The only time our military spending has been lower (as a share of GDP) was in the few years leading up to 9/11.

[bacchi]

Here are a couple thoughts on my part:
1) It's important to recognize that the whole "efficiency" thing isn't just about whacking whole departments, it's about cutting out the bloat within departments.  It's also about eliminating politically-motivated procurement requirements or incentives that drive costs higher, e.g. preferences for minority- or woman- or veteran-owned vendors.

Let's get rid of politically-motivated opioid grants and programs like https://www.dol.gov/agencies/eta/dislocated-workers/grants/health-emergency. There was a grant of $1.5B just a few months ago.

Housing can go, as can much of Transportation.  The fact that my town of 30,000 residents is waiting for a federal handout to widen a local road is just stupid.  The management of roads needs to be pushed to more local levels of government. 

I'm all for reducing the DOT but when DOGE is discussing efficiency, it's also talking about budget. Can your town widen the local road without relying on funding from elsewhere?

Department of Labor, too.

That sounds like a FAFO move.

3) The military is a bit of a mess.  Too much brass, too many pet projects, too much bureaucracy in procurement.

There's a base near me that's on the chopping block every time they talk about closures but the local congressling saves it. The DOD wants to close it but blah-blah-local-economy.

[zolotiyeruki]

Housing can go, as can much of Transportation.  The fact that my town of 30,000 residents is waiting for a federal handout to widen a local road is just stupid.  The management of roads needs to be pushed to more local levels of government. 

I'm all for reducing the DOT but when DOGE is discussing efficiency, it's also talking about budget. Can your town widen the local road without relying on funding from elsewhere?

My vision, if you want to call it that, is that instead of taxes going all the way to DC, then distributed back to the municipalities (minus the cost of a bunch of bureaucrats), the funding be both generated and spent locally.  I.e. trade federal taxes for local taxes.

Department of Labor, too.

That sounds like a FAFO move.

Can you elaborate?  Unlike my teenage son, in a disagreement, I prefer to be right rather than to win, so if I'm off base, I'd love to hear why/how so I can correct my views.

3) The military is a bit of a mess.  Too much brass, too many pet projects, too much bureaucracy in procurement.

There's a base near me that's on the chopping block every time they talk about closures but the local congressling saves it. The DOD wants to close it but blah-blah-local-economy.

And that's a prime example, IMO, of people (wrongly) thinking of the federal government's role.

[sixwings]

Great, let's do it. A lot of the funding gets sucked out of rich blue areas and then redistributed to the poor rural red areas. Let california and new york keep their money, let Louisiana and West Virginia burn and their bridges and roads collapse. It's what people in those areas want. Counties with a few thousand want to fund their 50M road and bridge upgrades instead of having the wealthier and more populated blue cities and states do it? I say we let them!

[Psychstache]

Here are a couple thoughts on my part:
1) It's important to recognize that the whole "efficiency" thing isn't just about whacking whole departments, it's about cutting out the bloat within departments.  It's also about eliminating politically-motivated procurement requirements or incentives that drive costs higher, e.g. preferences for minority- or woman- or veteran-owned vendors.  I would argue that anything DEI-related (like this or this or this or this, at salaries nearing $200k/year(!)) needs to go.  At best, it's a waste of money IMO, and at worst, it actively destroys productivity and morale.  The lions share of anything social-media or PR-related can likely go as well.  Use-it-or-lose-it budgets need to go away.  Procurement needs to be streamlined.  How many hundreds of billions of dollars were wasted or defrauded during the pandemic?

2) What departments or major spending should go?  Definitely Education is a valid target.  You're going to have to work really hard to convince me of the net benefit of the federal DoE.  They take tax dollars in, dole taxpayer dollars out, and employ a bunch of people in the process.  Taxpayer-subsidized student loans are definitely on the menu.  They subsidize college attendance, not graduation or marketable skills or knowledge, and have contributed to the tremendous inflation in college costs over the past 50 years.  Housing can go, as can much of Transportation.  The fact that my town of 30,000 residents is waiting for a federal handout to widen a local road is just stupid.  The management of roads needs to be pushed to more local levels of government.  Department of Labor, too.

3) The military is a bit of a mess.  Too much brass, too many pet projects, too much bureaucracy in procurement.  Too many cooks in the kitchen, too many pie-in-the-sky dreams driving unreasonable requirements.  A friend who worked on a particular fighter jet told me that there was a senator who wanted his rather petite granddaughter to be able to fly a new fighter design.  The cost to re-engineer just one of the fighter's systems to accommodate her physiology was in the eight figures.  The process of procuring an existing, off-the-shelf product is stupidly complex--one part of the organization says they want it, another has to write up requirements saying "we need a device that does X, Y, and Z," a third department then takes those requirements and then looks around to see if such a widget exists, a fourth department controls the money, and a fifth has to do the approvals, and nobody wants to stick their neck out.

All that said, US military spending is near its lowest level, as a share of GDP, in nearly a century.  The only time our military spending has been lower (as a share of GDP) was in the few years leading up to 9/11.

So your first point talks about using a scalpel, and the next point is cannon. You call out the DoEd and talk about student loans but ignore all of the other programs they are engaged in, like Special Education and Head Start. How do you decide the scalpel/cannon method for which department?

[zolotiyeruki]

So your first point talks about using a scalpel, and the next point is cannon. You call out the DoEd and talk about student loans but ignore all of the other programs they are engaged in, like Special Education and Head Start. How do you decide the scalpel/cannon method for which department?

That's a great question, and plays into a much broader question of "how do you determine if a program has been/will be worth it?"  Politicians LOVE to spend money in order to appear to be solving a problem, but there never seems to be a feedback mechanism to determine if a program was effective and what, if any, unintended consequences followed.

So here's a counter-question: why ought Head Start and SpEd be taxed/funded/administered on a federal level, rather than on a state level?

[bacchi]

Housing can go, as can much of Transportation.  The fact that my town of 30,000 residents is waiting for a federal handout to widen a local road is just stupid.  The management of roads needs to be pushed to more local levels of government. 

I'm all for reducing the DOT but when DOGE is discussing efficiency, it's also talking about budget. Can your town widen the local road without relying on funding from elsewhere?

My vision, if you want to call it that, is that instead of taxes going all the way to DC, then distributed back to the municipalities (minus the cost of a bunch of bureaucrats), the funding be both generated and spent locally.  I.e. trade federal taxes for local taxes.

I'm all for it but you've gotta realize that less populated areas won't have enough tax base to maintain let alone add new roads.

There's a county road in California that was washed out and the county is waiting on millions for repairs (discussed in one of Real Estate threads). It probably shouldn't be repaired because it only serves a handful of people but that's an example of infrastructure that would be delayed if not shelved.

Edit:

Yet even that [$100M in county debt] will not cover everything: Mountain Charlie Road represents only one emergency road repair out of 80 that the county has no money and, until now, no plan to repair.

This type of scheme would disproportionally hinder rural areas and small towns.

Department of Labor, too.

That sounds like a FAFO move.

Can you elaborate?  Unlike my teenage son, in a disagreement, I prefer to be right rather than to win, so if I'm off base, I'd love to hear why/how so I can correct my views.

The DOL was created in the early 1900s because of labor/management disputes. It's responsible for OSHA and fair pay and employment discrimination and child labor laws. Cutting the DOL budget by 75% (or whatever) sounds great, and it would save $11B, but workers would quickly realize that the DOL is necessary when they're in a disagreement with their employer about overtime pay and factory safety.

In other words,

"We don't need this oversight! We trust our company HR!"
<a year passes>
"Hey, why are so many kids working on the slaughter house floor?"

[Morning Glory]

So your first point talks about using a scalpel, and the next point is cannon. You call out the DoEd and talk about student loans but ignore all of the other programs they are engaged in, like Special Education and Head Start. How do you decide the scalpel/cannon method for which department?

That's a great question, and plays into a much broader question of "how do you determine if a program has been/will be worth it?"  Politicians LOVE to spend money in order to appear to be solving a problem, but there never seems to be a feedback mechanism to determine if a program was effective and what, if any, unintended consequences followed.

So here's a counter-question: why ought Head Start and SpEd be taxed/funded/administered on a federal level, rather than on a state level?

Because it levels the playing field between kids in rich and poor states/areas. I can afford to move if federal special Ed funding gets cut and my state or county doesn't (or can't afford to) pick up the slack, but most people cannot.

There's also talk of that getting kicked over to health and human services (not back to the states) if the DOE gets cut, and I really don't want Kennedy and his quack theories anywhere near my children.

There's plenty of international data suggesting that early childhood education is a great monetary investment for countries in terms of future tax revenue,  reduced crime, etc. in addition to quality of life for children and families (just google it). It would be penny wise-pound foolish to cut it.

[sixwings]

Housing can go, as can much of Transportation.  The fact that my town of 30,000 residents is waiting for a federal handout to widen a local road is just stupid.  The management of roads needs to be pushed to more local levels of government. 

I'm all for reducing the DOT but when DOGE is discussing efficiency, it's also talking about budget. Can your town widen the local road without relying on funding from elsewhere?

My vision, if you want to call it that, is that instead of taxes going all the way to DC, then distributed back to the municipalities (minus the cost of a bunch of bureaucrats), the funding be both generated and spent locally.  I.e. trade federal taxes for local taxes.

I'm all for it but you've gotta realize that less populated areas won't have enough tax base to maintain let alone add new roads.

There's a county road in California that was washed out and the county is waiting on millions for repairs (discussed in one of Real Estate threads). It probably shouldn't be repaired because it only serves a handful of people but that's an example of infrastructure that would be delayed if not shelved.

This type of scheme would disproportionally hinder rural areas and small towns.

Department of Labor, too.

That sounds like a FAFO move.

Can you elaborate?  Unlike my teenage son, in a disagreement, I prefer to be right rather than to win, so if I'm off base, I'd love to hear why/how so I can correct my views.

The DOL was created in the early 1900s because of labor/management disputes. It's responsible for OSHA and fair pay and employment discrimination and child labor laws. Cutting the DOL budget by 75% (or whatever) sounds great, and it would save $11B, but workers would quickly realize that the DOL is necessary when they're in a disagreement with their employer about overtime pay and factory safety.

In other words,

"We don't need this oversight! We trust our company HR!"
<a year passes>
"Hey, why are so many kids working on the slaughter house floor?"

Conservatives at this point are mostly morons who think that they can do it alone without government help because they are fine without realizing that the government is ensuring they avoid disaster. Because the government stops these issues from happening conservatives think the government isn’t needed because the bad things didn’t happen. These morons have fucked around for too long and now it’s time to find out. In 2020 Biden voting counties accounted for 70% of the economic activity in the country, I haven’t seen anything from 2024 but I doubt it’s changed much. Conservatives benefit massively from the generosity and redistribution from blue areas to red areas while hating on the coastal elites who make their lifestyle possible.

Let’s do this, time to find out, let’s stop the cash flow from wealthy blue areas to poor red areas. Without having to bail out Florida after every hurricane California and NY can instead invest in housing and solve the homeless problems conservatives are always bitching about (while having never visited), and people on the florida panhandle can figure out how to fund their repair efforts after the first hurricane blows through. Maybe if Ron Destntis begs Newsom and calls him daddy on TV he might toss some cash his way. Let the communities of a few hundred people in WV figure out how to rebuild the bridge that connects them to town without blue voters money.

Conservatives have forgotten what these government programs due to fund their rural lifestyle because they take it for granted. Let these morons put their face on the stove to see if it’s hot (it’s very hot).

[Telecaster]

Here are a couple thoughts on my part:
1) It's important to recognize that the whole "efficiency" thing isn't just about whacking whole departments, it's about cutting out the bloat within departments. 

Agree and I did a lot government work in my career and boy I've got some ideas how to improve things.  But this project is vastly, and I mean vastly, more difficult and complicated that Elon and Trump seem to grasp.    There are reasons why every government department exists and why every dollar is spent.   The reasons aren't always good, but there are reasons and the reasons don't go away because you don't like them.   

For example, one of the big headaches around government procurement are all the rules designed to prevent waste, fraud, and abuse.    Getting rid of those rules would make everything cheaper and more efficient, but then there would be more waste, fraud, and abuse, and people would want new rules to end waste, fraud, and abuse.   

And you can't just whack a department without rolling the responsibilities somewhere else.   For example, you could get rid of Department of Education.  But our economy requires an educated workforce, and you can't have a educated workforce without spending public dollars.   Somebody has to administer those dollars.   

As a presidential candidate Rick Perry promised to eliminate the Department of Energy.    Trump appointed him DOE secretary with an eye on reform.   However, one Perry was appointed and learned about the things DoE does, he became a full throated advocate.   

And I've seen this movie before.  In 2016 Trump promised to do the same things.   He promised to balance the budget and completely pay off the national debt in eight years.   Of course, deficits under Trump exploded.   Trump also promised to reduce government regulations by 70%.   Guess what?  He didn't.   I didn't believe him then, and I don't believe him now.   

[Sailor Sam]

For example, one of the big headaches around government procurement are all the rules designed to prevent waste, fraud, and abuse.    Getting rid of those rules would make everything cheaper and more efficient, but then there would be more waste, fraud, and abuse, and people would want new rules to end waste, fraud, and abuse.   

My god, the motherfucking hoops we jump through in order to spend money. The general public has no earthly idea. The only thing worse than this stupidity would be removing the hoops altogether. Though, I could definitely get behind reducing a few of the hoops.

Right now, in order to make sure there are zero missed IT procurements, we're required to submit an IT checklist for all purchases. My XO just submitted a Purchase Order, with attached IT checklist, for bolts, screws, nails, filters, UV lights, etc. That particularly stupidity is just stupidity.

Your Humble Government Servant,
AboutTo NotBePaid

[Just Joe]

So your first point talks about using a scalpel, and the next point is cannon. You call out the DoEd and talk about student loans but ignore all of the other programs they are engaged in, like Special Education and Head Start. How do you decide the scalpel/cannon method for which department?

That's a great question, and plays into a much broader question of "how do you determine if a program has been/will be worth it?"  Politicians LOVE to spend money in order to appear to be solving a problem, but there never seems to be a feedback mechanism to determine if a program was effective and what, if any, unintended consequences followed.

So here's a counter-question: why ought Head Start and SpEd be taxed/funded/administered on a federal level, rather than on a state level?

Because it levels the playing field between kids in rich and poor states/areas. I can afford to move if federal special Ed funding gets cut and my state or county doesn't (or can't afford to) pick up the slack, but most people cannot.

There's also talk of that getting kicked over to health and human services (not back to the states) if the DOE gets cut, and I really don't want Kennedy and his quack theories anywhere near my children.

There's plenty of international data suggesting that early childhood education is a great monetary investment for countries in terms of future tax revenue,  reduced crime, etc. in addition to quality of life for children and families (just google it). It would be penny wise-pound foolish to cut it.

As a resident in a red state, I know enough about state's like our's to be reminded when discussing "state's rights" that some states were very slow to get on board with various national efforts that benefited people's health and equal rights. Some states might back slide on rights and protections if given the opportunity. Sometimes feels like banning books and school vouchers might be test situations to gauge voter's reactions.

[seattlecyclone]

Use-it-or-lose-it budgets need to go away.

Have you ever served on a board that was responsible for making a budget? A budget is a reflection of your organization's priorities; you have money that you intend to deploy with a purpose. In general you don't want departments coming in significantly under budget. There's always a long list of worthy things people would like to do that nevertheless don't make the cut for inclusion in the budget. Every dollar you allocate to some department or project that doesn't spend it is a dollar that could have been put toward something else if you had known in advance the first department wouldn't need it.

From the perspective of a budget writer, if some department didn't spend some significant fraction of their budget, I absolutely want to drill down into why that was, double-check their next budget request to see if the underspending is likely to reoccur, and reduce their next allocation if so.

Now, this means that a department has some incentive to use unspent budget toward the end of the year on items that perhaps wouldn't have been considered worthy expenditures earlier in the year. This is unfortunate, but the alternative—not reducing budgets for departments that spent less than they said they would—doesn't seem like it would be an improvement overall.

[rocketpj]

Any time people start listing all the things they disapprove of in areas they know nothing about, i always ask them to consider how much sense it makes when someone starts telling them how pointless their work is, or how obvious the solutions are to whatever problems they are facing.

Bottom line, the world is complicated. A massive country with 400 million people is really, really complicated.  Cutting things without thought is a fantastic way to create twice the problems down the road. 

And if government were run like a business, which is a weird fantasy of a lot of people, it would be vastly worse than it is now.  Which business?  Look at the most profitable companies in the world right now - Facebook, Google, Amazon and all the other hopelessly enshittified tech companies that get provide continually worse service while sticking it to providers, customers and clients in every direction.  Sounds like a great idea.  Sheesh.

I do think it would be pretty funny, as a non-US person, if all the 'low tax' Red States suddenly found themselves cut off from the generous firehose of federal cash they have been receiving from all the actually economically productive Blue States they hate so much.

[joemandadman189]

the total budget is ~6.8 Trillion per year, total receipts were 4.9 trillion leaving a deficit of ~1.8 Trillion

https://www.cbo.gov/publication/60843/html#:~:text=or%206%20percent).-,Total%20Outlays%3A%20Up%20by%2010%20Percent%20in%20Fiscal%20Year%202024,percent)%20more%20than%20in%202023.

I worry we cant get out of the mess we are in, that deficit ($1.8 trillion) is greater than than the total social security spending of $1.46 trillion, or rough equal to both health and Medicare spending combined. Net interest is ~900 billion a year now, roughly the same is spent on health, medicare, and national defense.

Small 10 billion dollar cuts likely aren't going to "cut" it and make a meaningful dent in the budget. Maybe the DOGE can find 1,800 - 10 billion dollar cuts in the overall budget, but i am doubtful

I think we need overall systemic reform on basically every government spending category. Services and benefits will need to be cut. Inflation can not rise and we need a way to increase tax receipts, reviewing the link below raising corporate taxes seems like a good place to start

https://www.visualcapitalist.com/breaking-down-the-u-s-governments-2024-fiscal-year/

[maizefolk]

For example, one of the big headaches around government procurement are all the rules designed to prevent waste, fraud, and abuse.    Getting rid of those rules would make everything cheaper and more efficient, but then there would be more waste, fraud, and abuse, and people would want new rules to end waste, fraud, and abuse.   

+1 to this. I work at a public university and we spend far more time (and hence money) on all these extra steps designed to prevent fraud or waste than any potential financial losses from the fraud or waste itself.

But for university administrators, it's a much more appealing to accept spending a bunch of money inefficiently than accept the career risks that come with headlines about fraud/waste occurring on their watch.

[wenchsenior]

For example, one of the big headaches around government procurement are all the rules designed to prevent waste, fraud, and abuse.    Getting rid of those rules would make everything cheaper and more efficient, but then there would be more waste, fraud, and abuse, and people would want new rules to end waste, fraud, and abuse.   

My god, the motherfucking hoops we jump through in order to spend money. The general public has no earthly idea. The only thing worse than this stupidity would be removing the hoops altogether. Though, I could definitely get behind reducing a few of the hoops.

Right now, in order to make sure there are zero missed IT procurements, we're required to submit an IT checklist for all purchases. My XO just submitted a Purchase Order, with attached IT checklist, for bolts, screws, nails, filters, UV lights, etc. That particularly stupidity is just stupidity.

Your Humble Government Servant,
AboutTo NotBePaid

My husband bitches constantly about this sort of thing.

[zolotiyeruki]

And if government were run like a business, which is a weird fantasy of a lot of people, it would be vastly worse than it is now.  Which business?  Look at the most profitable companies in the world right now - Facebook, Google, Amazon and all the other hopelessly enshittified tech companies that get provide continually worse service while sticking it to providers, customers and clients in every direction.  Sounds like a great idea.  Sheesh.

I think you've got it a bit backwards. As tech companies approach monopoly power, they become like the government--bloated, inefficient, wasteful, etc.  Spending gobs of money on what something that caught an executive's eye, or on pet projects?  That sounds remarkably similar to government....