In the tradition of spending all one’s annual budget in order to avoid cuts the next year, “A new analysis released by OpenTheBooks.com found 66 agencies spent $97 billion last September, the final month of fiscal year 2018.”
The list of luxury and frivolous items acquired with taxpayer money will make you weep. More
Base Line Budgeting. What private business could survive a budget like that?
Just another reason for a revolution.
I’m waiting for my Maine Lobster subsidy to come though…..I will love them…..
Same in state government. I remember every June the offices bought up everything not nailed down to zero out the accounts before end of fiscal year. Argument: We have to spend it or we won’t get fully funded next fiscal year. Managers rewarded for spending everything as they could not carry over a balance.
Oh, but it stimulated the crony-capitalist economy. It’s payback time for all the campaign contributions. More earmarks! More spending!
“Spend, spend, spending, spent. Spend, spend, spend, spend on spending. Spend a little more.”
(Damn, I can’t find that “Spending” video of Obama online any more.)
Same going on in my town. Haven’t had usual snowfall so when we get a half inch of snow they put down three inches of salt to use up the supply because whats left after the season is used when considering their budget for next winter.
Some years ago I worked for a county agency (that also received federal dollars). We HAD to get rid of $$ before the next fiscal year. Back then the activity was literally referred to as “spend down”. I bet they don’t use that phrase anymore, though.
The saddest part of this whole charade is that many, if not most, of the items being bought are not actually needed by the purchasing agencies, so they will later be sold as government surplus to private contractors for pennies on the dollar.
Your tax dollars at work.
Years ago, our local highway department had a budget line item for road salt. Then we had about 5 years in a row where there was no snow or ice, and the salt storage facilities remained full so the department head decided not to buy any more salt for a while.
Then we had a year with normal amounts of snow and ice, and all of the salt was used, so the department head put a salt line item in the budget for the next year. He got called on the carpet and grilled about why he needed a salt budget for this year when he didn’t have one for the prior five years. Needless to say, the department now has a salt line item every year whether they need it or not.
People ask why I don’t trust the federal government to run a national health care program. One reason is government accounting and budgeting is run in a manner that actively discourages any effort to be responsible – if you spend less money because you have less need in a particular fiscal year, you get penalized if you do ever need the funds in subsequent years. It’s one thing to have no incentive to be fiscally responsible, but it’s quite another thing to punish fiscal responsibility.
It’s time to change this system to one where bonuses are given to workers in those agencies that have had cuts in their spending. But before that, how about getting rid of public sector unions first? These public sector unions are the genesis of Washington’s war on Americans.
Knowing we were political pawns whenever a demo commie was in the White House, we’d take year end money and stock up on spare parts. Sure enough, 5 months later the demo commies would slash our budget and expect us to continue as if we were fully funded. Sort of an under the radar rainy-day fund.
We used to do that.
Every year.
Couldn’t soak it up in OT – had to be capital (?) expenditure – parts, tools, stuff.
Christmas come early (or late) depended on the fiscal year.
When the Ford Building was being re-modeled (after being taken over from the FBI) the rumor was that $50,000 / month disappeared. Just vanished!
Gov’t’s a magic act:
A conscious, conspiratorial effort, spanning decades, to make taxpayer money disappear. It spans Party, time, and space. Truly wobbles the mind.
And no – President Trump can’t fix it – if the media were doing their jobs, they’d be exposing it – but it isn’t as sexy as deposing a President (after Woodward and Bernstein, every “journalist” wants to topple a Republican President).
And so it goes.
izlamo delenda est …