Government Efficiencies and Postage

Ok.. anybody.. I want to know something that the government does as efficiently as the private sector. Anybody? Anything?

Is there anything the government does that costs less, has great value, and is run at such an efficient level that we want more of that governmental action? I think there's only a few things that they do anyway: have a military that breaks things and kills people (regardless of the cost that is what they are supposed to do), they collect revenue (through taxes and fees), they make legislative bills (of all kinds of pork..lately), they push postal service mail around the country.

Now, I don't know if we want a private sector business breaking things and killing people .. but there is other things the military does that assists this country. Usually it's assisting in times of disaster or some kind of policing patrol. Face it, the military is a good policing agent. And even though the price tag for the military is up there in the billions of dollars per year, there is probably room for efficiencies .. somewhere. I have to say I like the military regardless of how much it costs. Spending less is better... preferably.

Collecting revenue, well .. the IRS really is good at what they do as well. Though I imagine if they really wanted to cut costs, I'd vote the IRS out and replace income to the government with a flat/fair tax that is collected at the cash registers. Thus eliminating the need to fill out income tax forms to double tax the people of their money by taxing them when they make it.. and taxing them when they spend it. Take the cost of *taxation* out of the paychecks.. (no federal income tax taken out, no FICA, no other federal taxes) .. and boost the economy by everybody having more $$ to spend. Then, all of the products, because they no longer have a taxation element built into it, are all lowered by about 22-23% in cost at the cash register. A loaf of bread which might have cost $1 .. now costs $0.78. Then, when the loaf of bread is bought, a tax on the purchase of the bread (23%) is added back to the cost of the bread .. making it the same $1 used when buying the bread. The difference, the government gets all it's money, and we get more of the paycheck. The downside woudld be... a bunch of IRS workers would probably not have jobs, and a bunch of tax preparers not have jobs because there is no tax forms to fill out for the federal level of taxation. It's all collected from the merchant and electronically. Highly efficient.

Legislative bills... well.. this is something that those in government just seem to thrive in doing. It's also something that I don't think I want a private business doing either. I wouldn't mind if private citizens (not professional politicians) did this and bring some common sense back to the legislatures. The laws they write aren't so much about what you can and can't do (like rules a parent would lay down) but what money is spent on which pork project where. If there's an efficiency to be had, I'd say, if a bill can't be written on 5 pages of paper, then it's too verbose and should be filed in the circular waste recepticle. My rule would be, if you can't take the new bill and put it in front of a 6th grader and have him/her read it to make sense of what it says and he/she not be able to tell you what it says .. then it's too damn complicated. Toss it out. Yes, I think civilians can make this simpler. I think to write everything so as not to create any loopholes of law is a terrible way to write. Documents have a spirit of understanding about them. And as long as the spirit of that document is true, then it shouldn't matter that the words in it are only a few pages long. Everybody will be able to understand it written in plain English. Not everything needs to be written as if only lawyers can understand it. The laws of the people and by the people should be able to be read and understood easily by the people it governs. Period.

Pushing postal service mail ... we all know that the USPS isn't the only delivery service around. We also have FedEx and UPS (and a few others). Two fine organizations that I believe are amazingly efficient and are running in the black (profit) whereas the USPS (though I like the fact that a letter still costs less than $0.50 to send from coast to coast) they aren't exactly the most efficient organization in town. Back in 1997 I moved from east central Illinois to Indianapolis to start a job. Eventually, my family would catch up with me in a few months after housing arrangements had been made and after I had been in the new job for a while making good money. On one of the days, both daughters put a postcard into the same USPS box at the same time. I received the first one in two days... and the second one in .. .uhhhhhh.. what was it?... oh yeah... 3 weeks! Holy Cow! I have no idea how that happened. They were in the same tray (I guess) and taken from the street mail box @ the post office at the same time. It wouldn't be so bad if it was a day later or two would be bad enough... but 3 weeks? Crimeny! Oh well, this is not a new revelation to about anybody regarding the USPS efficiency and the private businesses FedEx and UPS. Even our President talked about it lately...



Sooo... there you have it. Now, I don't think our President was saying the USPS is a big crappy organization. The fact remains, private sector business is engineered to be efficient and to make a profit in order to stay in business. Governmental organizations aren't like that. They don't have to be efficient. And they don't have to make a profit to remain in business.

I'll also say, and I've said this for many many years, that when it comes time to raise the cost of postage .. round it up to the next $0.10 or $0.25 and always *bank* the difference into an account to gain interest. That way, if people are pay a little extra, then a little extra is saved .. a few pennies at a time ... and that account just grows and grows and grows! And when it comes time for the next postage increase.. keep the postage amount the same.. just lower the difference between what is collected per ounce and what goes into the savings pot. Let's say that an ounce cost $0.50 .. which is 6 cents more than now. Everyone pay the 50 cents per ounce and the government save the 6 cents. This happen a million times a day in the postal offices, walmarts, and anyplace else that sells postage, it'll increase quite a bit over time. Then, next year when postage goes up... instead of saving 6 cents per ounce to the bank... save only 4 cents per ounce... still.. people will still get their postage at 50 cents per ounce. Not as much will be saved.. but nonetheless.. it still will get put aside accumulating interest. The year after, instead of banking 4 cents per ounce, maybe it goes down to 2 cents per ounce. When we hit zero change.. it's time to up the postal charge to the next dime upwards or the next quarter. Always banking the difference between the postal ounce rate and the postal charged rate. Brilliant, eh? Eventually, this account could be a huuuuuuuuuuuuuuuge pile of money that can be used to do other things.

I don't really think there is anything that the government really does well with incredible efficiency that has the people of the United States of America begging for more government.