baseline budgeting - why should we abandon it?

[mmi]

You may have heard about all the equipment that got left behind when the U.S. left Iraq.

A lot of it was worn out, and it's expensive to ship many of those items back to the States. Big armies typically leave a lot of stuff behind.

I'd say the problem was twofold: first, we never should have been on the ground in Iraq 2003-11. And secondly, we went way overboard building up a presence there without any long-term plan to make it worthwhile. We had more than five hundred bases and outposts at the height of operations, with construction costs totalling around $2.5 billion. Facilities like Ayn al-Asad Airbase, aka "Camp Cupcake."

Were we going to maintain a large military presence there for decades? Was there any serious consideration put into answering that difficult question? Not until Mr. Bush finally woke up in his second term and realized how he'd been manipulated by people like Dickhead Chaingang with his ties to private contractors like Haliburton, Donnie Dumbsfeld, the wise-cracking buffoon he had put in charge of the Pentagon, and the other toads who led us into that disastrous invasion and very poorly planned occupation.

>>We need 3 Abrams tanks. Don't spend money on 50 Abrams tanks.

We've been selling tanks to Iraq, and we also left some behind.

Congress has approved several batches of arms sales to Iraq. The U.S. delivered the first batch of 140 refurbished Abrams tanks in 2012 in a deal valued at about $860 million.

As many as 70 of the first batch of 140 Abrams tanks were destroyed or fell into disrepair as the Iraqi Army fought the Islamic State in Anbar province this summer, former Iraqi Defense Minister Abdul Qader Obeidi said in an interview with Foreign Policy. Militants may have also captured a few, he said. — "Iraq Needs Weapons But Can It Keep Them?," ForeignPolicy.com, Nov 20, 2014​

>> Our military didn't care that it got left because so much of it was unnecessary.

Unnecessary for what? State National Guard units needed a lot of the same kind of equipment left behind in Iraq when called to respond to Hurricane Katrina and other natural disasters here in the US. It was in short supply, and the money that could have been used to buy it had already been expended.

 

[AlbqOwl]

The simplest definition for baseline budgeting is that the department or agency or division or whatever component of government is funded starts with this year's budget and adds or subtracts from it.

If a department doesn't spend all the money budgeted for it, the logical thing to do is lower the budget for the coming year. But since no agency manager or department head wants his/her budget lowered, they make damn sure every penny is spent plus a little more if they can get away with it. And then their next year's budget will at worst be the same, but will almost always be incrementally increased.

This practice:
1. Eliminates the agency's need to justify the money budgeted for that agency.
2. Encourages spending whether or not such spending does any good whatsoever. (And a whole bunch is not going to do any good whatsoever.)
3. Encourages overstocking and waste to ensure that everything is spent.
4. There is absolutely no incentive to economize, save, or make sure the taxpayer gets full value for money spent.

Compare that to zero base budgeting in which the agency starts with a blank sheet and has to itemize what they will need for next fiscal year with an explanation and justification for every item. There could be and should be a reward/incentive for any agency or department that was able to accomplish their objectives and at the same time save money and return funds to the treasury at the end of the fiscal year.

 

[reinoe]

A lot of it was worn out, and it's expensive to ship many of those items back to the States. Big armies typically leave a lot of stuff behind.

I'd say the problem was twofold: first, we never should have been on the ground in Iraq 2003-11. And secondly, we went way overboard building up a presence there without any long-term plan to make it worthwhile. We had more than five hundred bases and outposts at the height of operations, with construction costs totalling around $2.5 billion. Facilities like Ayn al-Asad Airbase, aka "Camp Cupcake."

Were we going to maintain a large military presence there for decades? Was there any serious consideration put into answering that difficult question? Not until Mr. Bush finally woke up in his second term and realized how he'd been manipulated by people like Dickhead Chaingang with his ties to private contractors like Haliburton, Donnie Dumbsfeld, the wise-cracking buffoon he had put in charge of the Pentagon, and the other toads who led us into that disastrous invasion and very poorly planned occupation.

>>We need 3 Abrams tanks. Don't spend money on 50 Abrams tanks.

We've been selling tanks to Iraq, and we also left some behind.

Congress has approved several batches of arms sales to Iraq. The U.S. delivered the first batch of 140 refurbished Abrams tanks in 2012 in a deal valued at about $860 million.

As many as 70 of the first batch of 140 Abrams tanks were destroyed or fell into disrepair as the Iraqi Army fought the Islamic State in Anbar province this summer, former Iraqi Defense Minister Abdul Qader Obeidi said in an interview with Foreign Policy. Militants may have also captured a few, he said. — "Iraq Needs Weapons But Can It Keep Them?," ForeignPolicy.com, Nov 20, 2014​

>> Our military didn't care that it got left because so much of it was unnecessary.

Unnecessary for what? State National Guard units needed a lot of the same kind of equipment left behind in Iraq when called to respond to Hurricane Katrina and other natural disasters here in the US. It was in short supply, and the money that could have been used to buy it had already been expended.

In no particular order...

1. Yes, I remember the supplies not being available for Hurricane Katrina intimately. What you're referencing is poor allocation of resources. GWB was more interested in nation building overseas that he didn't give a damn about what happened to this country. In addition to having unnecessary supplies, the supplies we did need were overseas.

2. Yes we sold the Iraqi's refurbished tanks. Tanks that otherwise would have been mothballed and left to turn to rust in some military garage. We didn't need them because they were excess capacity. And you reinforce my point. The ones we couldn't sell we just left anyway. You say that they were old etc, but that's like saying a car bult in 2012 is "old". It's still functional and the Iraqi's didn't have to buy it because we just left it there.

3. I don't disagree that we never should have been there in the first place. And I don't disagree that in addition to never needing to be there in the first place we also spent money on things we didn't need to spend money on.

 

[Critter7r]

Well shouldn't the FBI, CIA, NSA and DoD be line itemized since it's these agencies that tend to break the law/ skirt the law to do illegal things? Such as FBI paying $1m to a hacker to break into an Iphone then FBI breaking the law by not sharing how it was broken into.

I'm not saying they shouldn't, but if one is interested in reducing the overhead of the federal government, implementing a practice that will increase the time and/or manpower required for the budgeting process by (at least) ten-fold isn't the way to accomplish that.

 

[mmi]

Compare that to zero base budgeting in which the agency starts with a blank sheet and has to itemize what they will need for next fiscal year with an explanation and justification for every item.

When misapplied, this turns into an expensive and worthless exercise of reinventing the wheel by simply repeating the same tired analysis year after year. When things … change … e.g., new policy environment, new agency goals, new administration, new technology, very different levels of spending, etc, then a careful examination of programmatic activity is warranted. Otherwise, an application of ZBB is likely to be counterproductive window dressing.

What you're referencing is poor allocation of resources.

Sure. I think I was saying that.

>>And you reinforce my point. The ones we couldn't sell we just left anyway. You say that they were old etc, but that's like saying a car bult in 2012 is "old". It's still functional and the Iraqi's didn't have to buy it because we just left it there.

I don't see where we're disagreeing.

>>I don't disagree that we never should have been there in the first place. And I don't disagree that in addition to never needing to be there in the first place we also spent money on things we didn't need to spend money on.

So … I guess we agree in general. As I understand it, yer point is that gubmint shouldn't buy stuff we don't need. No argument from me on that. And in some cases, ZBB can help reveal such waste.

 

[AlbqOwl]

When misapplied, this turns into an expensive and worthless exercise of reinventing the wheel by simply repeating the same tired analysis year after year. When things … change … e.g., new policy environment, new agency goals, new administration, new technology, very different levels of spending, etc, then a careful examination of programmatic activity is warranted. Otherwise, an application of ZBB is likely to be counterproductive window dressing.

Sure anything can be manipulated by anybody in government who is determined to be dishonest or self-serving. But I don't see how you think ZBB would be counterproductive. At the very least, it could be structured so that it was completely transparent. And federal watchdogs would be able to see and point out the dishonesty and wasteful and self-serving aspects of it that is almost impossible with baseline budgeting.

 

[mmi]

I don't see how you think ZBB would be counterproductive.

I outlined my reasons earlier in this thread:

ZBB can create problems if it's not employed properly. It can lead to very destructive in-fighting. It can seriously delay and complicate the budgeting process. And it can be expensive. There typically isn't much money spent on putting together a budget, and staff time can be very limited, so those resources must be marshaled carefully.​

 

[cpwill]

and as i have asked others, what alternative budgetary system does the government use instead ... and why is that system found to be superior

Zero based budgeting. Where each agency and branch gets to start off having to justify expenditures, instead of assuming them as a right and entitlement.

 

[cpwill]

I outlined my reasons earlier in this thread:

ZBB can create problems if it's not employed properly. It can lead to very destructive in-fighting. It can seriously delay and complicate the budgeting process. And it can be expensive. There typically isn't much money spent on putting together a budget, and staff time can be very limited, so those resources must be marshaled carefully.​

In the beginning, I think that those concerns could indeed bear some fruit. The process itself, however, will become streamlined as it is continued, and just as today, most of this year's work will be carrying over what we did last year. Baseline Budgeting done wrong can be no less destructive.

 

[mmi]

The process itself, however, will become streamlined as it is continued

Pipe dream, imo. The effectiveness of any budgeting process depends much more on the attitude of the people involved and the nature of the specific programmatic environment than any "method."

>>Baseline Budgeting done wrong can be no less destructive.

Sure, I'll agree with that.

 

[AlbqOwl]

I outlined my reasons earlier in this thread:

ZBB can create problems if it's not employed properly. It can lead to very destructive in-fighting. It can seriously delay and complicate the budgeting process. And it can be expensive. There typically isn't much money spent on putting together a budget, and staff time can be very limited, so those resources must be marshaled carefully.​

Anything can create problems if not employed properly. Anything can create problems by those who have self-serving or opposing agendas. And if there is going to be destructive in-fighting, that will happen regardless of what system is employed.

When a hard working taxpayer's entire tax contribution can be wiped out by some bureaucratic frivolous outing or other nonsense in government, I would hope plenty of resources would be devoted to the budget process. I would hope the budget process would reflect a government by the people rather than a government by self-serving politicians and bureaucrats who have little appreciation or respect for where the money comes from.

 

[cpwill]

Pipe dream, imo. The effectiveness of any budgeting process depends much more on the attitude of the people involved and the nature of the specific programmatic environment than any "method."

Not really. People follow their incentives, and people in bureaucracy typically use last year's work to meet this year's iteration of an annual requirement.

 

[mmi]

Anything can create problems if not employed properly.

I don't find that observation very informative or even at all useful, tbh.

>>Anything can create problems by those who have self-serving or opposing agendas.

Ditto.

>>And if there is going to be destructive in-fighting, that will happen regardless of what system is employed.

Nah, some budgeting techniques are more likely than others to be disruptive.

>>When a hard working taxpayer's entire tax contribution can be wiped out by some bureaucratic frivolous outing or other nonsense in government, I would hope plenty of resources would be devoted to the budget process.

I'd say there's nothing about ZBB that would increase the likelihood of a "frivolous outing" losing its funding. It will be defended by its supporters in any event. That's how it got into the budget in the first place.

As I said, imo ZBB is likely to be useful if there's some significant change in the agency's culture or environment. Now if, e.g., substantial reductions in spending were required, then the "training session" in Las Vegas might be on the block. But I don't see ZBB getting it there with any significantly higher level of certitude.

I figure ZBB helps agencies get into a better position to accomplish their mission when conditions change significantly and those altered circumstances need to be accounted for. If big shots are treating themselves to perks and have the power to preserve them, staff in the budget office probably can't do much about it. Except perhaps get reassigned to Buttville for getting on someone's "list."

people in bureaucracy typically use last year's work to meet this year's iteration of an annual requirement.

And often with good reason, if conditions haven't changed much. Why would the rationale behind last year's budget suddenly become less defensible if the only variation in the programmatic environment is a marginal increase in costs or workload?