THE PAIN OF SEQUESTRATION
A post for Cranky
Opinion Saturday
Comments expressing an opposing
opinion are welcome, but please…no name calling…that includes you, you big
stupid head!
White House
tours have been cancelled, airports are experiencing delays, and veterans are
having benefits delayed. All these
events and more are blamed on forced Government spending cuts. The tax payers are feeling the pain, and the
need to maintain former Government spending levels is being demonstrated.
It is
somewhat surprising to me that Government cannot cut spending without reducing
services.
“Why does that surprise
you Cranky? Obviously you cannot have
the same level of service after you are forced to reduce spending and staffing
levels!”
When I
worked for a large brokerage firm many years ago, we were told by upper
management every other year from 1987 to 2008 to cut spending, usually by ten
percent or more. Our department did this
every time and never suffered a loss of productivity. How?
Why?
There is a
certain mentality in middle management of a large corporation which I assume is
much the same in Government. A middle
manager’s value is often judged by the number of people reporting to him. A middle manager is loath to reduce his
staff; it makes his position seem less important.
If you ask a manager if he can reduce his
staff by ten percent, he will explain seventy-eight reasons why the department
could not function with any less staff and in fact they should be increasing
staff.
When you tell a manager to cut staff by ten
percent and that he is expected to still get the job done, staff will be
reduced and the job will still be done.
A manager of
a large corporation will not reduce staff unless he is forced to cut
staff. An owner of a small business will
reduce expenses whenever he sees the opportunity because the savings go
directly towards his profit. A manager
of a large corporation does not have that same incentive.
A manager of
a large corporation sees opportunities to save money, and he tables it for when
he is told he has to make cuts. If someone retires and his position does not
need to be replaced due to technology- improving productivity that position
will still be replaced. When times are
good, you do not reduce costs. When
profits go down you need to be prepared for mandated expense reduction. Our
company ordered forced expense reductions 8-10 times over a 20 year period, we
complied every time and we still got the job done.
Government
should have had similar technology enhanced productivity improvements and yet
has seen zero forced expense reductions in the last 20 years. Why has sequestration caused reductions in
getting the job done (service)?”
Government
has no incentive to reduce expenses (this is government related; it has nothing
to do with the party in power.) Reducing
expenses simply makes everyone seem less important and valuable. When forced by sequestration to reduce staff
and expenses, upper management has the incentive to demonstrate that cuts were
untenable and will result in reduced services (either that or admit they were
not doing their job.) The more painful
those reduced services the better.
If a manager
of a large corporation is not able to produce even with reduced staff or
resources, he will be replaced.
Taxpayers
will feel the pain of sequestration. If
we do not, government managers will be chastised. The incentive in government is to prove cuts
are not possible, not that “we can find a way.”
In
government, difficult goals are impossible without increased resources. The business of government never goes out of
business.
In the
private sector, where there is competition, the way to accomplish the
impossible is simply to mandate it. Somehow
the impossible gets done.
The preceding has been the opinion of
a cranky old man and not necessarily that of management…Mrs. Cranky.
