So, the GOP is now saying that the cuts-- which should start hitting tomorrow-- really won't be that big of a deal. That the Democrats are trying to make it sound scarier than it really is.
While I'm sure the Administration and others will play it up a bit, it's sort of hard for me to take the GOP seriously here.
Wasn't the whole point of this thing that it would be, by very intentional design, an incredibly painful set of cuts, the very specter of which would force the two sides to come up with some sort of compromise? Now that public opinion is blaming the GOP for the failure to reach a compromise... it's just not really that big a deal after all?
Bracing myself for what's to come.
I work in a field largely funded by county, state and federal dollars.
Last week, I was blindsided at a meeting with county execs, told that the state's Office of Mental Health was gutting my mental health programs. Reducing us from 18 slots to 0.
The next day, I learned that the Office for People With Developmental Disabilities will be throwing a 6% cut at every voluntary provider in the state.
That's about a million dollars for my agency announced in the course of two days. That hurts.
Now we get to sit in suspense and see how exactly the sequester cuts will hit us.
It won't be pretty.
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4 comments:
Ugh. We're of course talking about this a lot at my GBCS meeting in DC right now. I found this interesting, with some good figures, like on malaria treatments, and WIC. http://democrats.appropriations.house.gov/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1037&Itemid=28
While I understand your position that the field you work in will be hurt. I find it kind of hard to be concerned about a cut that still leaves the federal government spending more than they did last year. When will common sense prevail there should be no sacred cows if the government writes a check it should be cut below last years expenditures. No exceptions we can not continue to spent a trillion dollars more than we take in each year. So be fair and balanced pick a percentage and reduce and reduce everything equally. It is this type of spending attitude that led to our current financial woes. It is also the way to enable outfits like yours to continue even if it is with reduced funds.
"So be fair and balanced pick a percentage and reduce and reduce everything equally."
No, no, no, no, no. Very bad approach. You wouldn't do that in any other sort of a situation, it's not the right way to go here.
For instance. My wife and I have had to deal with about a 10% loss of household income. She changed jobs several months back, started working with a non-profit, and then there were some funding issues, some furloughs, etc. So now we're about 10% down.
We had to take 10% out of our spending, but we couldn't just cut 10% across the board. That would be crazy, and we'd be in trouble. We can't spend 10% less on our mortgage payment, or the bank will want our house back. We can't cut 10% out of our car payments, or we'd lose our cars. So we had to pick and choose. Okay, let's take 90% out of how much I spend at record stores. Let's tweak our grocery list, get the store brand non-organic orange juice, but keep on with the hormone free milk for Sam. Cut back on dinners out, but we're keeping the gym membership because we really need it. Continue those monthly charity payments that are scheduled, but don't donate every single time we get a random request from non-profits. I wanted a new bike-- let's wait till next year.
It's no different in business. My agency was faced with close to two million in cuts over the past couple of years. Didn't just take it across the board, trim every department. Some departments were already underfunded. Some couldn't handle a cut. Some are just way too vital to people's lives and happiness. So we had to pick and choose. We had managers double up-- now, you can't find many managers who don't run multiple departments. Higher ups doubled up as well. Managers and up could take on more, eliminating those high paid positions-- direct staff, not so much, partly because they don't earn enough for that level of stress, partly because that creates health and safety issues. Some programs we had to cut entirely, some programs didn't lose a penny. Admin assistants got reassigned. So on, so forth.
Across the board cuts come when politicians are lazy and cowardly. They don't want to make hard choices. They know that no matter what, someone will be unhappy, so they say "okay, everybody gets treated equally." That's chickenshit. Make the tough calls.
And they know that. They get that. Which is why they designed the sequester to suck, to be a horrible, horribly solution. It was supposed to force them to go back to the table and make those difficult decisions, learn to compromise. But they copped out again.
The reason I like across the board cuts is that it keeps the government from picking winners and losers. Any cut can be shown to be harmful to some group or another. I think most agencies and programs could be cut moderately without unduly affecting one group or another through attrition and waste reduction.
Your personal example is taking a micro economic situation and applying it to a macro economic problem.
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