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The government often is more efficient than the private sector, but the prior point was over waste, fraud, abuse, and egregious mismanagement that would never be tolerated in the federal sector. Things like sexism, racism, nepotism, and so forth. Those and the damage done by blind pursuit of profit are things that simply aren't found with such frequency on the other side of the fence.
I have worked in both the private and public sector. In the public sector they give lip service to some of the issues that you mentioned, but racism, sexism, nepotism and etc. still exist.
For example, in what I have observed, office affairs are probably more prevalent in the public sector than private sector. Private companies can lay down strict rules and fire people for crossing the line whereas many public sector employees are protected by unions and getting rid of poorly behaving employees is nearly impossible.
The profit motive is a strong driver towards efficiency. Covering one's backside is the public sector equivalent.
Since we have admittedly drifted off topic, I suggest that calling it a tax subsidy is incorrect. The government takes money from people to give to other people. The subsidy is the money given to those who did not pay any taxes. Cutting the tax rate is simply reducing taxes, not subsidizing people who are paying the taxes. That the government needs to borrow from the Chinese and Japanese is a spending problem, not a taxing problem.
Will another aircraft carrier stop the next Boston Marathon-style bomber ?
Don't make it either/or. How about BOTH?
Nothing would've stopped the next Boston bomber because many of these events are inside jobs perpetuated on the people by our own intelligence agencies. Maybe a cut to the intelligence agencies would be a good idea, too.
The private sector is actually a bastion of waste, fraud, abuse, and egregious mismanagement that would never be tolerated in the federal sector at least.
The private sector is all of those things. It's laughable that anyone would believe the government is different or more efficient.
Yes, and there are those who hunt Bigfoot as well. Generations of politicians have come to Washington pledging to stamp out the proverbial waste, fraud, and abuse. There is precious little of it left these days.
That's laughable. Health care spending in America alone, whether private or public, is insanely inefficient. We spend over $1 Trillion a year treating diseases that are largely preventable. Even if it were half that amount, it would still be insane.
The government often is more efficient than the private sector, but the prior point was over waste, fraud, abuse, and egregious mismanagement that would never be tolerated in the federal sector. Things like sexism, racism, nepotism, and so forth. Those and the damage done by blind pursuit of profit are things that simply aren't found with such frequency on the other side of the fence.
The waste and inefficiency in government just takes a different form.
I'll use my pension as an example. My employer pays about 100% of my salary just to keep the pension fund solvent for me. My pension and other benefits cost more than my salary. No, that's not an exaggeration. If this wasn't a public forum, I'd show you my paycheck stubs.
I started strictly on the topic of tax cut vs. tax subsidy and wanted to explore the economic semantics of each. There's been topic drift, unfortunately.
Exploring semantics is just tedious and pointless. But I did answer your question.
I have worked in both the private and public sector. In the public sector they give lip service to some of the issues that you mentioned, but racism, sexism, nepotism and etc. still exist.
In light of the fact that there are 50+ state and equivalent governments and thousands of governmental units at levels lower than that, I have limited my comments here and above to the federal level.
At that level, actual commissions of the sins noted above tend to be rare and to be met with increasingly harsh disciplines and penalties. In the private sector, such things are part and parcel of everyday business, with disciplines and penalties most often reserved for those who complain.
You seem further to have been misguided into a belief that bad actors cannot be fired. What you should have understood is that federal employees can only be fired for cause. At-will employees can of course be fired for virtually any reason at all.
You seem to believe as well that the federal workforce is highly unionized. It is not. In total, about 25% of federal employees are members of unions, and those unions have sharply curtailed powers.
You seem also to believe that most businesses are materially constrained by competition. This is a fairy tale. Competition is at best a weak force in big business oligopolies where the cost of inefficiencies can simply be passed on to customers who have nowhere else to go. Many small businesses on the other hand have no practical competition and are also therefore not influenced by it.
It is too bad of course that we do not have a Freedom of Information Act that applies to the private sector. If we did, information regarding the depths of corporate waste, fraud, abuse, and egregious management practices would be easier to obtain and disseminate.
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