Congress: We Can't Afford Overpriced Contractors

Think it's cheaper for the government to hire contractors than it is to have work performed by in-house staff? Think again.

A new investigation by the Project On Government Oversight showed that using contractors actually increases the cost to taxpayers. On average, contractors cost twice as much as the annual compensation of comparable federal employees.

In one particularly dramatic case, hiring a contractor cost taxpayers 383% more than a comparable federal employee. Even worse, the government doesn't have mechanisms in place to do basic price checks.

Given that Congress' special "Super Committee" has the goal of cutting $1.5 trillion from the deficit by December 2, we can't just let this kind of government waste continue.

Help the government stop paying too much for contractors. Tell your members of Congress that we can't afford to pay double if we don't have to.
Dear [Decision Maker],

I am writing to urge you to read the recommendations outlined in a new report by the Project On Government Oversight (POGO), which shows that on average, contractors charge the U.S. government almost twice as much for services as what it costs to pay comparable federal workers.

[Your comments will be added here]

The U.S. government spends $320 billion a year on service contracts, but it hasn't even done an analysis to see whether this money is being well-spent. A new, first-of-its-kind study released by POGO shows that using contractors to perform services actually increases costs to taxpayers. Of the 35 occupational classifications POGO examined, it was cheaper to hire federal workers in all but just 2 cases.

http://www.pogo.org/pogo-files/reports/contract-oversight/bad-business/co-gp-20110913.html

The report compared contractor billing rates to the compensation of federal employees doing the same work. In some occupations, POGO found that the difference in price was so dramatic that anyone could easily see the government was getting ripped off. When the government hired a claims examiner for example, it paid contractors nearly five times more than if it had gone with a federal employee.

Given that Congress's special "Super Committee" has the goal of cutting $1.5 trillion from the deficit by December 2, we can't let this kind of government waste continue. You have the power to stop the government from wasting money on services.

Please read POGO's report today. We can't afford to be paying twice as much for services if we don't have to.

http://www.pogo.org/pogo-files/reports/contract-oversight/bad-business/co-gp-20110913.html
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