This morning I listened to an interesting report on the use of private contractors within all areas of government service. (ie. military, IRS, health care, public policy, etc.)

On one level is sound really good take the IRS for example: they told contractors they could keep 25% of all back taxes they collect. No government costs and lots of benefits. I guess you could say that this process is a lot easier than asking an accountant like Dave Burton about where your refund is. This usually happens when you have paid too much tax and you’re looking to get some of it back. But if you get to keep it, then surely this is in the best interests of everyone? Luckily there are websites such as TaxRise that can offer some more information about this, in case you are uncertain.

However, one thing stood out to me in the NPR report that seemed a bit odd. This “thing” was the mentality that the term “small government” means “low headcount”. In other words, part of the Bush Administration justification for using private contractors instead of hiring more government workers was that they were keeping a promise to have a small government.[@more@]

Hmm.. to me, the term “small government” refers to a limit on the amount of power or control the government has over the people. You can have a government with very little people on the payroll, but still have a ton of control over how folks live their lives within the boundaries of that country.

Remember those IRS contractors? It turns out that they had very little rule or procedures guiding their actions. So they hounded folks (even those who did not own money) and engaged in unethical behavior in their search for the almighty dollar. If it had been the IRS calling, the workers would have had more oversight and, statistically, would have collected more money.

My conclusion: hire more workers, put more controls on contractors (since they represent the Nation), and limited the amount of power controlled by the Federal government.