Say what you will about government bureaucrats, but when the full power of their incompetence is released, it is a sight to behold. We mean that in a good way this time, because for once, that incompetence might work to the advantage and benefit of regular Americans! Let’s start at the beginning. Earlier this…
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In 2012, California assemblywoman Fiona Ma backed AB 2482, a bill to license, yes, interior designers. Backers of the measure claimed it would protect consumers from unqualified home decorators, but as Dan Walters of the Sacramento Bee notes, “it was quite evidently aimed at limiting who could offer design services to potential clients –…
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People who work for the federal, state, or local governments in the United States are really well compensated compared to their peers in the private sector. That’s not so much because of the take-home pay, which is often in the same ballpark as what people with similar education and training earn in similar occupations…
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Back in April 2014, we described the newly unfolding tragedy of fraudulent waiting lists at the Department of Veterans Affairs’ medical facilities as a rationing scheme – one that was operated by knowing individuals within the VA for the purpose of enriching themselves: The VA has been wracked in recent weeks by reports of…
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We have good news and bad news on the U.S. government’s budget deficit for 2015. First, the good news from Reuters: The U.S. budget deficit is likely to fall by $60 billion in 2015 due to strong revenue gains, the Congressional Budget Office said on Tuesday, enabling the government to stave off default without…
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As we noted in 2013, politicians seemed intent on buying 280 more M-1 Abrams tanks the U.S. military didn’t want or need. The M-1 Abrams is a formidable machine but not really suited for counterinsurgency operations, and the tanks run $8 million each. Last year we alerted taxpayers to the new fleet of presidential…
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In this latest episode of our occasional series Bureaucrats Behaving Badly, we’ll focus on “the case of the federal worker who hardly ever worked,” to borrow the Washington Post‘s own headline! Lisa Rein reports: A federal patent examiner racked up more than 18 weeks of pay last year for work he didn’t do, but…
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As we recently noted, the California Department of Transportation (Caltrans) pays 3,500 full-time employees to sit around at their desks, as one legislator put it. According to Investigations of Improper Activities by State Agencies and Employees, a new report by state auditor Elaine Howle, they were doing much more than that. One Caltrans engineer,…
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California borders the Pacific Ocean, the largest body of water in the world, so desalination is a no-brainer for the Golden State. But as Dan Walters of the Sacramento Bee shows, government is not exactly eager to slake the parched state’s thirst. The San Diego County Water Authority is building a desalination plant near…
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A century ago, Americans going to the recently invented movie theater would often be entertained by short comedy films, such as Mack Sennett’s Keystone Cops series. Aside from the visual gags, many of these early films drew their humor from depicting people employed in a government profession as being something other than competent in…
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