An out-of-the-box solution to the most inside-the-box problem we face: how to pare back the Immortal Bureaucracy? Elon Musk’s answer: PAY THEM for two years after they vacate the premises. You may rankle at the idea, but when you get right down to it, it’s a pretty small price to pay to dismantle the mechanism that powers The Swamp.
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Everyone should watch the 1993 movie “Dave”. There are scenes where the Presidential double need to cut the budget to fund another project. He brings in a friend who is a CPA and they saved a few hundred million in two days. Brilliant.
Sounds reasonable, but how do you make sure that while you’re paying one hydra head off, two more don’t sprout?
NONONONONoo!!! don’t tive them ANYTHING~! THEY ARE JUST SUCKING THE TEAT NOT WORKING!!
I work for the government (IRS). If I were given 2 years severance, I’d be gone, and be better off.
And if asked what I did (and why) I’d be able to in seconds. Id even be able to show why I save money by writing (required) letters instead of higher paid ones doing that instead of them doing the more complicated stuff.
This is done in Australia but a left wing government can and has put them all back in less than a month. You have to make the job obsolete. You have to make the job free market cutting the need for bureaucracy, revenue and congress/ parliament out of the process completely. Politicians should NOT be doing money and administration all together. Parliament’s should do law, mostly criminal and safety law, and nothing else. Ten hours a year. Assurances Contracts (crowdfunding) and Blockchain Smart Contracts were invented as free market tools to marketize or convert to enterprise all public goods. The… Read more »
This whole discussion, of an idea of which I heartily approve, reminds me of an old Lawyer joke which I will paraphrase and make two noun substitutions.
Q: What do you call 1000 Bureaucrats at the bottom of the Potomac?
A: A good start!
Not advocating any actual drownings!
What do you call a bus load of bureaucrats going over a cliff?
A shame.
What do you call a bus load of bureaucrats going over a cliff, with an empty seat?
A crying shame.
This idea of a graduated “thinning down” as proposed by Musk isn’t new. There’s the “Black Friday” approach as mentioned by @Rich below, which inevitably winds up destroying a lot of people very quickly, seems to me, and it also seems like something Musk would like to avoid.. But the graduated way of thinning the herd occurred in the U.S. military after the Cold War. I know of several soldiers who took the severance package and, without a retirement, left the service. These options were available for soldiers in certain jobs — not for everybody — and it shouldn’t surprise… Read more »
Awfully lenient, but likely more palatable than the MDC (McDonnel Douglas) “Black Friday” approach, where mostly managers were all ‘laid off’ on Friday, then allowed to re-apply for ‘their’ (former) jobs on Monday. Note: 90% of those jobs were deleted and the 10% new ones were awarded based on merit. Those not getting job had to go back “to work” (as engineers), leave, or retire. As a semi-retired aerospace engineer, I agree w/Bill’s aircraft analogy regarding cutting fat & dead-wood, else solution spirals out of control (this is what happened to the St. Louis based A-12 weight & cost). Cull… Read more »
I’ve said this once before: who gathers the money from taxes, keeps people honest and does medicare and social security if the IRS is gone?
IRS also collects Federal unemployment taxes and heavy duty vehicle fees.
Many if not most people are unable to fully grasp things on a large and complex scale. They tend to underestimate and oversimplify to the point of useless banality. The government is a large scale complex entity. This is less true of the people here on this site and more true broadly applied to the people who work in the Federal Government. We have people here who cannot grasp the bigger picture and think they know what they need to but they’re uncommon. There are genuinely good, intelligent people who work in our government and they are also less than… Read more »
If the Republican Party can stick to the path it APPEARS to be on now, the Democrat Left will be left sputtering in the dust until they learn their lessons and also become a national asset. Some 50-ish years ago, back when Politically Correct was unheard of, I asked my Aunt a question starting with the word If. She responded “If your Aunt had balls, I’d be your uncle!” The moral of the story is that IF is a really big two letter word. But, we are set up well and I hope (nay Pray) that Trump’s victory has solidified to some… Read more »
Yeah, I agree. Just like it’s a mistake to think Joe Biden doesn’t f^ck up everything he touches, it’s a mistake in the afterglow of a decisive victory to think that the Republican Party isn’t going to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.
Maybe not but the odds aren’t good from a historical viewpoint.
You guys have a 60 cycle hum in your audio. Just so you know, I can live with it.
Bill mentioned on TSL that he has been having some tech issues and they had to sh^tcan the first attempt at Backstage this week.