
Congress should grow the Digital Services budget, it more than pays for itself - rmason
https://thehill.com/opinion/technology/444159-congress-should-grow-the-digital-services-budget-which-more-than-pays-for
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ryanobjc
It's being cut because that's the destiny of all competent government. That's
why the USPS was budgetary crippled by being forced mto prepay all pension
obligations.

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hiram112
Since the budget is being cut in half and the majority of costs are for the
techies working there, I'm wondering if anyone is going to be cut earlier than
planned.

It would have sucked to give up a decent gig in the private sector for a
promised 3 or 4 year tour with USDS, only to get cut after 1 year, especially
since most employees end up moving from out of state to the DC area with all
the accompanied costs.

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duxup
The whole policy of cutting good government for the sake of cutting ANY
government is maddening.

I've seen similar situations at the state level where good programs that help
people get their lives in order and get off government programs are cut under
the banner of saving money... mostly targeted by politicians who are upset by
government programs.

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travmatt
It’s much easier to argue for privatizing government services that are poorly
run and wasteful, than services that are well run and efficient. Making them
function better would be antithetical to the end goal.

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chis
My understanding is that this budget is just a bargaining tactic. Note that it
includes huge boosts to defense spending, 8 billion for a border wall, and
cuts to every agency that democrats like. [http://www.ncsl.org/ncsl-in-
dc/publications-and-resources/pr...](http://www.ncsl.org/ncsl-in-
dc/publications-and-resources/president-s-2020-fy-budget-an-ncsl-summary.aspx)

Also, I’ve never heard of the USDS but it’s a fantastic idea. There are lots
of people in tech talking about how unfulfilling it is to work on optimizing
ads all day and would totally take a pay cut in exchange for meaningful work.
They should be advertising themselves more heavily.

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kelnos
Correct. The President does not set the budget; Congress does. The President
works up and releases a budget both as a bargaining tactic and as a means to
send signals to Congress as to what his priorities are. However, Congress is
under no obligation to follow the President's wishes on the budget, and often
departs from the President's proposed budget in many areas.

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zrail
A good example is last year when Congress essentially completely ignored the
Presidential budget.

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giancarlostoro
Those darn checks and balances.

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nixgeek
It’s outrageous the USDS is being cut so dramatically, they do amazing work
and reducing investment seems incredibly short-sighted to me.

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tomohawk
What's outrageous is that the agencies that are providing important services
are so inept at contracting for the services or hiring personnel that a whole
other agency is required to come in and save the day. This highlights how
unaccountable these agencies are for their incompetence.

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sjg007
It makes sense for the government to have a specialized agency to run these
services and even manage the contracting if it is necessary. Have experts hire
specialists etc...

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tomohawk
The VA (veterans admin) alone has more than 350,000 employees. This does not
count contractors, which could easily double the count.

Your idea makes sense if you're talking about an organization in the hundreds,
but an organization the size and breadth of the VA already has the
responsibility to do this job, and given their budget and headcount, they
should be able to do this job and have the specialists required to get it
done.

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swarnie_
Anyone who doubts the effectiveness of Government Digital services needs only
look at [https://www.gov.uk/](https://www.gov.uk/)

The range and depth of the information/services on here really have blown me
away in the past few years. I've personally used it to renew my passport and
driving licence, get information for my taxes and seek information for a legal
matter. Truly brilliant service (rare for a UK IT project)

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0898
From copywriting to UX, Gov.uk truly is the envy of the world.

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westurner
> _The U.S. Digital Service isn’t perfect, but it is clearly working. The team
> estimates that for every $1 million invested in USDS that the government
> will avoid spending $5 million and save thousands of labor hours. Over a
> five-year period, the team’s efforts will save $1.1 billion, redirect almost
> 2,000 labor years towards higher value work, and generate over 400 percent
> return on investment. Most importantly, USDS will continue to deliver better
> government services for the American people, including Veterans who deserve
> better._

> _In the private sector, these kinds of numbers would not lead to a 50
> percent cut in budget. Instead, you’d clearly invest further with that kind
> of return. Considering the ambitious goals set out in the President’s
> Management Agenda, the Trump Administration should double down on better
> support for the public, our troops, and our veterans. The best way to do
> that is clearly through investments like USDS._

Why would you halve the budget of a team that's yielding a more than 400% ROI
(in terms of _cost savings_ )?

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Digital_Service](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Digital_Service)

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pjc50
> Why would you halve the budget of a team that's yielding a more than 400%
> ROI (in terms of cost savings)?

Because that goes against the official doctrine that the state is wasteful?
Why do it inhouse when it could be outsourced to someone for twice the price
that will return the money in kickbacks as campaign contributions?

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satya71
I suspect it's more to do with hitting the bottom line of the election
financiers.

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satya71
Tobias Macey recently interviewed David Holmes, director of engineering at
USDS. There's plenty of background and insight into how USDS came about and
how it works. [https://www.pythonpodcast.com/usds-government-software-
episo...](https://www.pythonpodcast.com/usds-government-software-episode-210/)

