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Comment by cubano | Hacker News Reader

> The trendy idea that taxes in general and progressive (not in the political sense but in the technical sense) tax systems are somehow unfair is holding up important development in the U.S.

I would disagree.

The opposing trendy idea is that the eventual output of the tax systems are so filled with waste, fraud, and abuse that simply pouring more and more money, no matter the source, into politically-connected blackhole businesses contracted to perform some government sponsored task rarely if ever works and needs to much more carefully managed.

There are so many real-world examples of this (healthcare.gov comes instantly to mind, and the recent TSA app but there are many others) that I won't bother to list them.

A much greater level of transparency for all these deals would go a long way in helping fix these sensible concerns.

[edits]

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This might be a trendy idea (and is not wrong, per se) but honestly the data simply does not back it up. The GAO estimates that waste, fraud and corruption amounted to approximately $126 billion in 2014.[1] Sure, that's a huge number, but realize that the entire government spend for 2014 was 3.77 trillion dollars.[2] This context is crucial - this "black hole" you are lending such argumentative weight to only amounts to a 3% loss. Even if we were to double the GAO's estimate to 6%, I'm not really convinced that really provides a rational basis for describing the output of tax systems as "so filled with waste, fraud and abuse".

No reasonable person objects to combating waste, fraud, and abuse. But it is certainly not as widespread as some people might believe.

[1] GAO-15-814, Federal Spending Accountability - http://www.gao.gov/assets/680/672473.pdf

[2] US Federal Budget 2014 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2014_United_States_federal_bud...

edit: a word, "it is not wrong, per se"

I personally find it almost absurd to expect the very agencies that are nominally in control of Federal expenditures to reliably track and then expose their own waste, folly, and, yes, theft of taxpayer funds.

Why do you think their is such huge support behind political establishment outsiders such as Sanders and Trump?

Many people are simply exhausted by the lies and deceit that flows from elite Washington circles nowadays, and thinking that self-reported figures are going to placate them is wishful indeed.

I didn't downvote you, but I think you need to do some self-directed reading.

The GAO is widely credited from all sides for its standout analysis and data gathering, independent of partisan affiliation or regulatory capture. Its methods are quite rigorous and indeed, if you read the report that I linked in my previous comment, you would see how some of the GAO's investigatory successes have come from comparing agency self-reports against independent audits.

As I said before also, nobody disputes that waste and fraud are bad and should be stopped. But the problem is not nearly as widespread as generally believed - and that is the problem, because it elevates an minor issue to an outsized status at the expense of other, larger issues.

> But the problem is not nearly as widespread as generally believed...

Yes well we agree to disagree because I firmly believe, and my 35 years of experience following the issue closely prove to me at least, that not only is the problem widespread but is papered-over and much worse then will ever be reported.

There is a solid statistic that something like only 10% of crime is reported on and solved. I think this number matches nicely to the real damages, waste, and fraud caused by the issue.

> the problem ... is papered-over and much worse then will ever be reported

If it's not reported, how do you know about it?

nobody disputes that waste and fraud are bad and should be stopped. But the problem is not nearly as widespread as generally believed - and that is the problem, because it elevates an minor issue to an outsized status at the expense of other, larger issues.

Makes me think of voter fraud vs electoral participation...

> pouring more and more money, no matter the source, into politically-connected blackhole businesses contracted to perform some government sponsored task rarely if ever works

1) The evidence is very much to the contrary: Almost all infrastructure in the country was paid for by tax dollars and built on government contracts. The entire highway system, the military, most of the health system, almost all education including public universities, most scientific research, etc. WWII was won that way. What would the country look like if there was no public investment? It would be a poor, undeveloped nation.

2) What alternative is there? Not invest in anything until we live in a perfect world? Again, it would impoverish the country. Blocking investment is a very unwise method of saving money for any institution; imagine a business which refused to invest in anything - it would be insane.

3) I agree there is corruption, and I agree more transparency would help, but every human institution has corruption (go ahead, name a large one that doesn't). If we're going to live with humans, we have no choices other than to move forward as we are or retire to caves.

I am not against public investment.

I am for using modern IT practices to add transparency and accountability to the process.

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