The 109th Congress should:
- eliminate the Cabinet-level
Departments of Agriculture, Interior, Transportation,
and Veterans Affairs;
- close down major
independent agencies such as the Small Business Administration, the
Corporation for National and Community
Service, the Legal Services Corporation,
and the Appalachian Regional Commission; and
- terminate obscure
independent agencies like the Advisory Council
on Historic Preservation, the Japan–United States Friendship
Commission, the Marine Mammal Commission, America’s Education Goals
Panel, the State Justice Institute, and the United States Institute of
Peace.
-
privatize Amtrak by selling the passenger rail service,
including operations, maintenance, stations, rails, and trains, as a
single unit and ending all federal subsidies;
-
privatize air traffic control
by moving all operations to a private nonprofit corporation similar to
Canada’s;
-
expand the opt-out program for
federal airport security to cover more airports; allow airport operators
in the opt-out program to hire security employees directly or to
contract out for security services; and monitor all airport screening
operations to make possible performance comparisons;
-
privatize federal electric
utilities by selling the Tennessee Valley Authority and the four power
marketing administrations to private investors;
-
support competitive outsourcing
by embracing the Bush administration’s management reforms and adopting
the Commercial Activities Panel’s recommendations on federal
contracting; and
-
hasten privatization of
military support services by allowing private operation of the entire
military housing inventory, accelerating military utilities
privatization, and giving the Pentagon more flexibility in the
contracting-out process.
Explore the labyrinth of Government
Bureaucracy
Privatization in a post 9-11
world
Pundits and policy-wonks seem to use the word "privatization"
in two different ways:
- Instead of Government workers building schools that government
wants, government hires private contractors to build schools that
government wants.
- Instead of the Government building the schools it wants, parents
build the schools they want using the miracle of the Free Market.
Kevin Craig supports "privatization" in the first sense only as
and when it serves as a stepping-stone to full privatization in the second
sense. "Privatization" in the first sense might save a few
dollars, but often locks out the possibility of saving much more, and of
more effectively meeting the demands of consumers, by moving to full
privatization.
Next: Budget Deficits
|