The Baltimore Business Journal quoted Peter Orszag, President Obama’s Director of the Office of Management and Budget, as saying, “Too much money is spent on too many wasteful contracts, and too many contracts are awarded with too little competition.” Obama and Orszag want to save $40 billion dollars by revamping the contracting system. This is a great idea and long overdue.
Although, I have one question for Orszag and Obama: “How can you talk about cleaning up contracting when you’re spending so much money?” Taking steps to improve the contracting system is vital, but doing that while you’re passing $1 trillion bills with little accountability is like taking one step forward and two steps back. Cleaning up contracting, but still letting congressmen and senators pack bills with pork is like taking half a step forward and four steps back.
Yes, the way contracting is allotted is faulty. But so is the way we spend money. Making contracting effective would be much easier if the wasteful spending aspect were addressed as well. Just as a plant or animal will die without food or water, companies that thrive on wasteful contracts will die without the money to fund them.
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