The national paperwork workload increased by 5.5 percent in fiscal 2005 over the previous year to reach about 8.4 billion hours, according to a new Office of Management and Budget report.Come on, people. This is the 21st century! Use some dadgum computers. This is yet another symptom of a hugely bloated system that continues to get bigger and bigger. The source of the bloating is pretty simple -- each new federal office implements a huge number of new forms and paperwork (ostensibly necessary in order for it to do its job), and then it can never be eliminated, because then who would issue and process that paperwork?
Ick.
3 comments:
Having seen the evil government bureaucracy first-hand I can only agree with your "Ick" statement. It's really depressing. So many of the forms that I've filed with government agencies could have been filed in five minutes via common sense. Instead, they are transferred throughout the office and stamped and restamped and returned marked "rejected without review" because I only mailed it in duplicate, not triplicate. Somehow, I'm pretty sure Hell is full of forms requesting glasses of ice water which are permanently being stamped and returned for additional information on how hot your throat is and asking for three references who can varify your agony. Bleh. Glad Jesus is getting me into Heaven!
Hehe...this made my day.
-Magen
Use some frickin' computers.
Indeed--is it just me or does it seem like, with the possible exception of the IRS, the government agencies that most need to be thoroughly computerized are the ones that are least so? Take the DMV (MVD here in NM, RMV in Massachusetts...): none of the three states I've lived in as an adult have been able to accept credit cards at the DMV. Nevermind that I almost never have cash on me (well, until I started living on tips this summer, anyway) and have the checkbook (or even know where it is) handy even less often--and I'm not unique in that respect. I appreciate that the overhauls necessary to bring most government agencies up-to-date would be expensive, but I suspect they'd pay off in the long run. *Sigh*
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