Government business: 100 percent failure rate

Social Security was established in 1935 - they've had 74 years to get it right; it is broke.

Fannie Mae was established in 1938 - they've had 71 years to get it right; it is broke.

Freddie Mac was established in 1970 - they've had 39 years to get it right; it is broke.

Together Fannie and Freddie have led the entire world into the worst economic collapse in 80 years.

The U.S. Post Service was established in 1775 - they've had 234 years to get it right; it is broke, and even though heavily subsidized, it can't compete with private sector FedEx and UPS services.

The War on Poverty was started in 1964 - they've had 45 years to get it right; $1 trillion of our hard earned money is confiscated each year and transferred to "the poor"; it hasn't worked.

Medicare and Medicaid were established in 1965 - they've had 44 years to get it right; they are both broke. Now our government dares to mention them as models for all US health care

AMTRAK was established in 1970 - they've had 39 years to get it right; last year they bailed it out as it continues to run at a loss!


"Cash for Clunkers" was established in 2009 and went broke in 2009, in 3 weeks. After 48% of the cars purchased turned out to be produced by foreign companies, and dealers nationwide are still buried under bureaucratic paperwork demanded by a government that is not yet paying them what was promised.



I predict future happiness for Americans if they can prevent the government from wasting the labours of the people under the pretence of taking care of them.
-- Thomas Jefferson

reply to post by The Change Weenie


Kind of puts things into perspective doesn't it?
The kind of thing we never really stop to consider.

Are there any successes?

I'm hard pressed to think of any...

You forgot The Mustang Ranch

A whorehouse in Nevada that the owner made into a $100 million per year business. The government took it over in lieu of back taxes... bankrupt.

Which begs the question of how in the world do you screw up the business model of a whorehouse? Money, sex, women, bedrooms and customers...not like the set up is anymore complicated than that. Were their cost overruns in making the place ADA compliant?

Your forgot the Federal Reserve. You will notice the Fed has failed miserably at the publicly stated goal of “Stablizing the Economy” but what about the Feds actual goals?

The Federal Reserve like the Canadian system, is based on the Bank of England not Henry Thornton's's guiding principles for monetary policy as they should have been. What are the Primary Goals of the Bank of England? According to “A History of the Federal Reserve 1913 to 1951” by Meltzer [pg 20]

• the profits of the bank
  
• avoidance of panic [bank runs that would destroy the bank and possibly injure/kill the banker]
  
• the appropriate response to short term changes
  

G. Edward Griffin added more goals of the US Fed

• Concentrate banking power in New York
  
• prevent business from self-investing instead of borrowing
  
• prevent competition
  
• Pass banking losses off on the US tax payer (FDIC)
  

As far as the ACTUAL goals the Fed has been very successful. This calls into question whether the reason the government has failed at the other programs is because of hidden goals which were met as successfully as the actual goals of the Fed were. Or was the true goal of all these programs to transfer money from the tax payer to the bankers???

Makes one think doesn't it?

Originally posted by The Change Weenie

"Cash for Clunkers" was established in 2009 and went broke in 2009, in 3 weeks. After 48% of the cars purchased turned out to be produced by foreign companies, and dealers nationwide are still buried under bureaucratic paperwork demanded by a government that is not yet paying them what was promised.

:

Most Hondas and Toyotas- with the exception of the hybrids, and made in the US. The only American-brand car in the top 10 for cars sold during the rebate period- the Ford Focus, is made in Mexico.

reply to post by crimvelvet


I get what you're saying but the FED is not an official government program
not that it makes any difference. They let the FED run wild for so long that that in itself is failure.

I dont understand why folks have such a beef with the Post Office. The Post Office which is actually in the constitution and the Federal Government is supposed to run and maintain, hasnt been a government entity since 1982 Thier funding is directly from fees from postage and other fees. They can borrow money from the Government at a reduced interest rate to cover shortfall but they have to pay that money back. The Post office isnt allowed to completely be private however, they are still required to service every address six days a week in the United States. Fedex and UPS are not required to do so and their deliveries are only during the 5 day work week. The Post Office is also required to deliver all those flyers, circulars, and general junk mail. The POst Office also isnt allowed to turn a profit all monies over budget go into back to the Federal Government.
How expensive do you think UPS and Fedex would be if they had to meet all the delivery requirements that the Post Office does.

A few examples of how much postal rates are in other countries, all these rates are for first class letter within these countries a letter from Germany to any other European Union will cost a bit more .70 Euros which would be 1.01 usd. While to send a letter from the US to any EU country is only 98 cents and thats after flying it across the Atlantic Ocean.

First class letter postage in the US is 45 cents thats anywhere in the US from Maine to Hawaii.
First class letter postage in Germany is .55 Euros or 80 US cents
First Class letter postage in Canada is 54 Canadian cents or 50 US cents
First Class Letter postage in the UK is 39 Pence or 64 US cents
First Class Letter postage in France is .56 Euros or 81 US cents
First class Letter Postage in Australia is 55 Australian cents or 47 US cents

So considering how much area the US Post Office had to cover 44 cents is a bargain and certainly cheaper than other western countries. The Post Office may have some problems but compared to the rest of the Federal Government it is the least offensive entity.

reply to post by DarkStormCrow


The problem is the US Post Office operates at a loss. If they were FedEx or UPS, they would have gone out of business, like DHL. They can operate at a loss because they are partially sponsored by the federal government.

The Post Office is not there to make a profit it is there to deliver the post as required by the constitution. UPS and Fedex would be out of business if they were forced to stop at every address 6 days a week and deliver all the flyers and junk mail the post office has to and you could be guarenteed if Fedex and UPS had to do that your cost would be much higher by at least 1.00 usd in postage. UPS and Fedex are not under the same regulations as the Post Office, so it is comparing apples and oranges.

reply to post by stevegmu


The US Post Office is required by law to NOT make a profit.

So unless you know someone who can operate a busines of that size to the penny.....they have to operate at a loss.

reply to post by villagesmithie


I didn't say anything about making a profit, they just shouldn't operate at a loss. If they were competently managed, they would break even, rather than lose money on every letter delivered.

NASA
The Internet
Interstate Highway System
Manhattan Project
Panama Canal
Rural Electrification Project
Hoover Dam
Transcontinental Railway

AND

Your Local State University
Your Local Police Department
Your Local Fire Department

I get your point.

However, you are selling too short by saying the government can't do anything well.

There are plenty of examples of successful government run operations. The above is just a very short list. Obviously.

[edit on 9-9-2009 by Axial Leader]

reply to post by Axial Leader


Nasa-famous for project delays and cost overruns in the billions of dollars...

The Internet- you mean that DARPA project? as in the black hole for money DARPA? how many billions did it cost? how much would it really have cost if it had not been run as a black project from the start and then adapted to civilian use...not to mention that the funding for it comes through private companies now

Interstate Highway System- don't get me started...driven much lately? roads are in a constant state of disrepair, and the idiots can't seem to plan ahead when widening one lane at a time instead of doing 3 and not having continuous construction for 8 years running. and the roads are paid for not just by the feds, but a third comes from local govt taxes(such as sales and property taxes, bond sales, etc) which are in the case of taxes, perpetually rising to make up for the debts incurred by overspending in the social programs

Manhattan Project- well i can't argue here, we definitely got some bang for our buck there. only spent $5 billion per bomb

Panama Canal- nothing like false propaganda by William Cromwell regarding the proposed Nicaragua route in favor of the Panamanian route that would run through the land of his clients, rather wealthy clients that is, the violation of a foreign state, Colombia, and the creation of a new banana republic in the form of Panama, in exchange for a lease. Yes, a naval blockade is an act of war, but hey, it worked out fine for us right... Tolls were raised almost 30% in 1979 and additionally by another almost 10% in 1983...while operational costs remained more or less the same... ahh, the smell of govt efficiency and it only cost 27,500 lives, well at least in the construction phase, no counts on how many from the US instigated war

Rural Electrification Project- now all the power is owned by private companies, not the govt, despite the vast investment by Dept of Ag to set it up, and the operational and upkeep costs are still passed onto consumers, so not really an example of govt running something well, just an example of private corporations using cronies in govt to pay for their new cash cows

Hoover Dam- well it does serve its purpose, but at what cost? no regard was given to the ecological impacts so that's a fail in my book because the alteration of the water cycle has (imo) caused at least some of the drought issues

Transcontinental Railway- From 1850-1871, the railroads received more than 175 million acres (708,000 km²) of public land - an area more than one tenth of the whole United States and larger than Texas. Paid for by public bond sales at discount rates, the land was then resold by the railroads at significantly higher rates, with area near the railroad at a steep premium..so Union Pacific made off like bandits on the US taxpayers dime via bond sales and subsidies on each mile of RR built. up to $48k/mile. Yes the bonds were paid when they came due, but the land was sold to the RRs at such a discount that the resale of the land back to the American people could have paid for the RRs themselves. And the Crédit Mobilier scandal due to Congressman Oakes Ames and Thomas Durant using shell companies to collect additional govt subsidies, as well as steering the path of the rail towards personal landholdings to increase both mileage (and therefore subsidies) as well as personal land value? not a success story for the govt, imo.


but hey, look at the great indoctrination system, i mean education system that we have...give all the money to the feds, who take their cut to run a bureaucracy and then send a percentage back to the communities to run their schools...what a system...



THE GOVT IS A RACKET. THAT'S ALL THERE IS TO IT.

May I add the US Military.

We spend in excess of $600 Billion a year, and yet we haven't been on the winning side of a war since WWII. And in WWII, Russia and Brittan did the heavy lifting in Europe, and we needed to nuke Japan to win in the Pacific.

List of losses or stalemates:

1) Korean War
2) Veitnam.
3) Somalia (Black Hawk Down)
4) The never ending war on Terror.

I know we kicked Iraqi butt in Gulf War one; however, we failed to remove Sadam back then, as a result he killed hundreds of thousands of his own people who tryed to revolt expecting US support that didn't come, and Bush's son took us back to Iraq for round two that I still can't say that we won.

Originally posted by finemanm
and Bush's son took us back to Iraq for round two that I still can't say that we won.

Really? Didn't we remove S. Hussein and his government within a week? Winning the war was easy. Maintaining peace among people fighting over a 1400 year beef is another story.

My local state University pays out more than 60% of it's revenue (government funding, tuition, fees, ect.) to the top administrators. Every year the admin votes themselves pay raises, reports bigger shortfalls on monetary issues, and cuts more classes. While raising tuition, adding fees, and increasing student head count.

But of course, let's not forget.

Basketball, which is a wretched waste in this "school", in 2007 had 0 wins and 100% losses. But it was a cool enough place to bring in a high name schmoe to pay him $5m a year on contract. Wait... what? I terrible sports team gets a new coach who gets $5,000,000 a year? YES!

A couple years ago, when it was popular for the footyball players to beat up on whomever they chose at local bars, on the streets, ect. (as was known by many common folk that they had roid cycles) that the school LOST millions of dollars. (in the tens) and somehow "found" a bit more than half of what was "lost".

Lost? found? what? who is their accountant?

Universities are run by the same type of jackasses who run wallstreet. They have money, doesn't mean they give a # about you or morals.

Universities aren't about education anymore, it's about sports. Most of the town can be seen in the colors of the school on a football game day, from babies to grandparents. Of course, none the wiser to important issues, but at least they all have it together when they need to wear their colors.

[edit on 9/9/2009 by mynameisjuan]

this might be the greatest ATS topic ever

Originally posted by stevegmu
reply to post by DarkStormCrow

 

The problem is the US Post Office operates at a loss. If they were FedEx or UPS, they would have gone out of business, like DHL. They can operate at a loss because they are partially sponsored by the federal government.

I think that's the problem with GOVERNMENT ..........

They don't care and DO NOT THINK ..... its a blank check, you get it!!! think about any other business if they didn't have to worry about money, I mean like they had a Magic ATM machine ... actually they do its the tax payer.

a GUARANTEED CUSTOMER errrr Financier.

reply to post by stevegmu

I guess I didn't make my point clear. I am not talking about profit. I am talking about the different restrictions the post office operates under.

When a business plans their budget for the year they plan for a certain amount of profit. If gas price go up or sales are down they will say "profits were down this year".

The US Postal Service plans their budget to break even. They don't have the buffer of a profit margin. If gas prices shot up for them they have to say "we operated at a loss". So to suggest that "operating at a lose" is a sign of failure is to ignore their unique situation.

Originally posted by stevegmu

Originally posted by The Change Weenie

"Cash for Clunkers" was established in 2009 and went broke in 2009, in 3 weeks. After 48% of the cars purchased turned out to be produced by foreign companies, and dealers nationwide are still buried under bureaucratic paperwork demanded by a government that is not yet paying them what was promised.

:

Most Hondas and Toyotas- with the exception of the hybrids, and made in the US. The only American-brand car in the top 10 for cars sold during the rebate period- the Ford Focus, is made in Mexico.

It's where the cash flow ends at the end of the day... 48% of the FUNDS went to foreign companies' bottom lines.

[edit on 15-9-2009 by The Change Weenie]