Paul Krugman hates outsourcing federal work to contractors. He claims that bureaucrats in the federal government have gotten a bad rap.
Have I got news for him.
I worked as a contractor in a federal agency last summer and was treated abominably.
The working conditions were lousy, most particularly the constant back-stabbing and tattle-tale-ing.
Most of the people I worked with were conscientious and tried to make the best of a bad situation, but they were not as driven as those in the private sector to keep up their skills or do things efficiently and cost-effectively.
It made me wish that Libertarian Presidential candidate Harry Browne were still with us. If Harry had been elected, he would have done away with the whole mess. He used to joke about decimating the federal civil service system, and requiring a pledge of allegiance to Libertarian principles by those remaining: “all six of us”.
Too bad he never got that chance.