Privatization

Feb 8, 2016

Top 400 Taxpayers See Tax Rates Rise, But There’s More to the Story

As Americans were gathering party supplies to greet the New Year, the Internal Revenue Service released their annual report of cumulative tax data reported on the 400 tax r...

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Feb 4, 2016

Chlorine Bleach Plants Needlessly Endanger 63 Million Americans

Chlorine bleach plants across the U.S. put millions of Americans in danger of a chlorine gas release, a substance so toxic it has been used as a chemical weapon. Greenpeace’s new repo...

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Jan 25, 2016

U.S. Industrial Facilities Reported Fewer Toxic Releases in 2014

The Toxics Release Inventory (TRI) data for 2014 is now available. The good news: total toxic releases by reporting facilities decreased by nearly six percent from 2013 levels. Howe...

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Jan 22, 2016

Methane Causes Climate Change. Here's How the President Plans to Cut Emissions by 40-45 Percent.

UPDATE (Jan. 22, 2016): Today, the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) released its proposed rule to reduce methane emissions...

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more news

Competitive Sourcing Continues to Fail

Nov 24, 2008 by Adam Hughes*

The Government Accountability Office (GAO) released a new report on Friday on the Bush administration's competitive sourcing initiative, which allows the federal government to hold public-private competitions for the right to deliver commercial services for the government (things like janitorial services or food preparation or maintenance). If a private sector bid can show savings of $10 million or more or 10 percent of the cost of providing those services in-house, they win the competition. /p>

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Orszag to head up OMB?

Nov 19, 2008 by Adam Hughes*

The National Journal has been reporting this week that current Congressional Budget Office (CBO) Director Peter Orszag is in line to head up the Office of Management and Budget in the upcoming Obama administration. Orszag formerly served as a senior economic adviser during the Clinton administration and held a post in the economics studies program at the Brookings Institution.

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Trust But Verify

Nov 12, 2008 by Adam Hughes*

Argh! More bad news about the Defense Contract Audit Agency (DCAA), the watchdog at the Department of Defense that is supposed to watch out for waste and fraud within the agency's enormous contracting apparatus. DCAA was in the news a lot this summer (see here, here, here, and here) after information surfaced showing the DoD spends too little on contract oversight and interferes with current auditors to restrict the length and scope of investigations. It doesn't look like things have improved much since then.

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Inconsistency at the IRS

Oct 31, 2008 by Craig Jennings

The USA Today reports today that the IRS sent out $1.6 billion in incorrect tax refunds during the 2006 and 2007 tax filing season. The information was released in a recent report from the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration (TIGTA). The TIGTA investigation found that the IRS has low-balled their initial estimate of the fraudulent tax refunds in 2006 and 2007 and that the agency has insufficient resources to adequately detect and stop these refunds from being dispersed.

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Silver Lining to the Financial Crisis

Oct 24, 2008 by Craig Jennings

If anything, the collapse of the nation's financial markets has forced even the staunchest of believers in the Free Market^® to consider the possibility that sometimes the "market" doesn't know best.

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FedSpending.org Will Blow Your Mind

Oct 2, 2008 by Adam Hughes*

Great news from the technology trade pubs today - FedSpending.org has been selected by PC World Magazine as one of the top five sites out there that will raise your political awareness. Woohoo! Below is the screenshot of the article: Read the full article: 5 Sites That Will Boost Your Political Awareness

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Interesting Perspectives on the Bailout

Oct 1, 2008 by Adam Hughes*

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OMBW Budget Brigade Swings and Misses

Sep 25, 2008 by Adam Hughes*

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POGO Running on All Cylinders

Sep 19, 2008 by Adam Hughes*

Earlier this week, we highlighted two hearings in the House of Representatives that were focusing on issues of waste, fraud, and abuse and federal contracting. Our friends over at the Project on Government Oversight (POGO) have had their A-game this week. They not only testified at one of those hearings, but have provided some excellent previews, commentaries, analysis and reports, and summaries on the hearings this week. All of the POGO materials are worth at least glancing through, if not reading thoroughly.

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Congress Running Short on Time

Sep 18, 2008 by Adam Hughes*

It looks like the end of the current congressional session is in sight, maybe. While legislators had an insurmountable work load to complete in the three weeks of work in September, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) still hopes to adjourn the Senate a week from tomorrow (Sept. 26). Reid is hoping the Senate can still finish quite a lot in the next 6 days, including energy legislation, a tax cut extension bill (with an Alternative Minimum Tax patch), a new economic stimulus package, and some number of appropriations bills and a continuing resolution.

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