Customer Service and Regulatory Burden

Via NASCOE USDA requested comments on ways for reducing regulatory burden  under Obama's Executive Order 13563.  They were due by today.  So naturally I procrastinated until the last minute.  But I finally did offer my accumulated wisdom, which I've published as a Google document here.   Anyone who wants can insert comments, or even edit the damn thing.

[Updated: corrected language and added link to the FR document.]

Government Citizen Intermediaries

One of the issues in the government-citizen relationship is the role of intermediaries.

I remember the CED of Sherman County, KS in 1992 (Info Share days) being very disgusted with a firm which offering help to farmers dealing with payment limitation and conservation compliance issues.  He thought his office ought to be able to do everything his farmers needed, and have the farmers be content with it.  I have something of the same feeling with regards to IRS: our tax system and their software should be good enough to deprive Intuit and H&R Block of their business.  Of course, I know better.

With that as a preliminary, let me quote some paragraphs from the Jackson Lewis Civil Rights Assessment:

The Contract directed that the Assessment Team obtain USDA customer input by written surveys which were originally scheduled to conclude in August 2010 for inclusion in the Final Report by October 26, 2010. During the course of the Contract, however, USDA decided that the survey methodology was less likely to secure the type of reliable data necessary for this Assessment, and the Department replaced this approach with 30 customer Focus Groups in 10 of the 15 Assessment States, which required an extensive and time-consuming approval process by the Executive Office of the President, Office of Management and Budget (“OMB”). The OMB process delayed the Assessment Team’s efforts by at least 90 days. As a result, the Focus Group sessions began in Mississippi on January 6, 2011, and concluded in California, with the completion of the 30 sessions on February 3, 2011.
Focus Group recruiting was difficult in large part because of low interest, and attendance was generally below normal expectations. While helpful customer input was elicited from the Focus Groups, the Assessment Team recognized the need to supplement the Focus Group input by interviewing 30 Community-Based Organizations (“CBOs”) to obtain additional customer input, essential to the process but not originally by the Contract. [page iv]

 First, I wonder whether USDA had gotten OMB approval for the surveys, before switching to focus groups. Having had to deal with those OMB requirements, I had a bit of schadenfreude when I read of the big shot law firm's problems with it.

Second, and the point. It's disturbing to learn there are so many CBO's.  That alone indicates the depth of USDA's problems: people don't create organizations just for the hell of it, or if they do the organizations don't stick around; 30 CBO's indicates a big gap between FSA/NRCS/RMA/RD and their customers.

Third.  So far in my reading I've not seen any metrics on these CBO's--how many states they operate in, how many members they have, what areas they focus on (blacks, women, Latinos), did they include any tribal organizations?

[Updated: for some reason I have a mental block on the name of the firm doing the CRA.]

Blew My Mind

Texas lawmakers allow rural hospitals to hire doctors, to help relieve shortages.  That's the heading on the RSS feed for this.  Although the article explains the situation somewhat, I still find the original prohibition strange.

A Canticle for Leibowitz

Via Tyler Cowen at Marginal Revolution, famous science fiction writers pick famous science fiction books. I haven't read any science fiction since I turned 30 (I reread some favorites after 30, including the book by Mr. Miller.)

Farmer Suicides in India

Treehugger has a post publicizing the terrible toll of suicides among farmers in India: one dies every thirty minutes.

Let's see, that's 48 every day, or 17520 a year.  An amazing rate.

How many suicides occur in the US in 2007? 34,598 or a rate of 11.5 per 100,000

According to the CIA factbook on India, the labor force is 478 million, of which 52 percent are in agriculture, meaning there are about 250 million Indian agricultural workers.    17520 divided by 2500 (i.e., 100,000's) gives a suicide rate for agricultural workers of 7 per 100,000

I'm sure the stresses of the agricultural economy account for many of the suicides in India, but they need to be considered in some context. (Note: I've seen an earlier piece challenging the farmer suicide meme along these same lines, so this isn't original with me.)

Bureaucrats Will Be Our Defense Against Zombies

That's what I learn from one of the leading scholars of zombies, Dan Drezner, and his post (which cites another post which cites CDC).

Let's Spread Out SNAP Payments

In the old days people would have a hard time stretching their monthly welfare/food stamp benefits over the whole month.  These days "food stamps" are no longer stamps, or even paper; they're bits on a debit card.  I assume it would be as easy and cost no more to issue food stamps weekly instead of monthly 

There's research showing that people whose money comes in weekly spend more wisely than when the same amount arrives monthly. So why don't we change the payment issuance schedule to weekly?

Ad Hoc Disaster Isn't Real Money

From Farm Policy, quoting Mr. Stallman of the Farm Bureau:

“Farmers are willing to rely instead on Congress passing temporary ‘ad hoc’ disaster bills, he said. Spending on such bills typically is added to the budget deficit rather than being taken from the farm bill.

The point being is the political debate is always about authorizations (the farm bill) and appropriations (or the omnibus appropriation or the continuing resolution), never about the contents of the actual deficit.  That permits smart legislators to play games with spending, because all the pundits just assume the deficit is the result of the policies which are debated.  

How Old Am I? II

When skimming an entertainment column in the NY Times, I saw Peter Townshend was doing a memoir.  I said to myself, I didn't know Princess Margaret's true love was still around.

I gather The Who are some new rock band? 

Poor Timothy Geithner

Slate's piece on Dominique Strauss-Kahn's compensation says:

DSK's compensation and expenses are in line with his peers, the small handful of central bankers and finance ministers at the helm of the global economy. The president of the World Bank, for instance, makes almost exactly same amount. As per the bank's most recent annual report, Director Robert Zoellick earns $441,980 in salary, plus $79,120 for living expenses.

What's missed is our Treasury Secretary, arguably the most important of that "small handful". He earns $191,300, a cut of more than 50 percent from his NY Fed job. And I'm pretty sure ordinary government travel regulations apply.  He probably could get business class on long trips, seems to me I remember some other Cabinet members successfully arguing the point, but no $3000 hotel suites.