Senate Bill Lowers Contractor Compensation Cap Nearly $300K

A Senate bill would reset the maximum amount taxpayers pay government contractors for their employees’ compensation back to its original level, adjusted for inflation, and would change the formula for determining future increases in this level. This is commonly referred within government and contracting circles as the contractor compensation cap.

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GAO: Lower Contractor Compensation Caps Would Save Hundreds of Millions

Hundreds of millions of dollars per year could be saved if Congress lowers the maximum amount the government reimburses contractors for their employees’ compensation, according to a new report released yesterday by the Government Accountability Office (GAO), Congress’ investigative arm.

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White House At Odds With House on Weapons Cancellations

It's an old battle: executive branch expertise on how it thinks taxpayer dollars should be spent versus the congressional power of the purse. This story plays out often in the yearly authorization and appropriations bills for the Department of Defense (DOD). This year is not any different as a White House statement from yesterday makes clear.

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Senate Passes Amendments to Shed Light on Contractor Misbehavior

The Senate has approved several amendments to the National Defense Authorization Act (S. 3254), which will bring greater transparency and accountability to federal contracting. The amendments, which OMB Watch endorsed, would strengthen whistleblower protections for federal contractors and grantees, modeled after the protections pioneered in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. 

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Federal Appeals Court Behavior Creates Gridlock

Steve Pearlstein’s latest column, published in The Washington Post earlier this week, exposed the aggressive, anti-regulatory decisions of the United States Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. These decisions are driven by industry arguments designed to create policymaking gridlock.

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Treasury Department: We’re Going to Show You the Money

 Testifying before a Senate hearing on federal spending transparency, Richard L. Gregg, the Treasury Department's Fiscal Assistant Secretary, announced a major advancement in federal spending transparency: starting in 2013, the public will be able to see Treasury data on agency expenses and payments to recipients of federal contracts, grants, and loans.

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America Would Know Less Under House Census Policy

Since 1790, Americans have used the Census as a tool to understand who we are and where we stand as a nation. However, our ability to gather this crucial data would be crippled under a bill recently passed by the House.

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DATA Act Passes House, Moves on to Senate

Today, the House passed the Digital Accountability and Transparency Act, or DATA Act (H.R. 2146), by a voice vote with strong bipartisan support. The bill to strengthen the transparency of federal government spending was sponsored by Oversight and Government Reform committee chairman Darrell Issa (R-CA) and ranking member Elijah Cummings (D-MD) and 13 other representatives.

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New CAP Papers Offer Contracting Reform Recommendations

The Center for American Progress (CAP) has released a series of three new papers on how the federal government can improve contracting through selective insourcing, better auditing, and increased transparency. Each paper contains specific recommendations that would help improve how Uncle Sam doles out contracting dollars and the return Americans could see on that spending.

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How to Strengthen Transparency in the U.S. Open Government Plan

Yesterday, OMB Watch submitted its recommendations for the Obama administration's national plan for the Open Government Partnership (OGP). The administration will unveil its plan, with new concrete commitments to increase transparency, at the international OGP meeting on Sept. 20.

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