Smashville66 t1_j2e223t wrote on December 31, 2022 at 3:59 PM

I worked for the US government my entire career, and this always drove me batshit. My budget was a “mandatory spend”, whether useful or not. We’d buy promotional giveaways just to spend the money. Think about that…a federal agency buying can cozies because if we didn’t spend the money allocated to us, we’d get a smaller budget the following year. It just seems to encourage fraud, waste, and abuse.

SDN_stilldoesnothing t1_j2e5no4 wrote on December 31, 2022 at 4:24 PM

I worked in the Canadian Government for 10 years.

The one that drove me "batshit" would be us getting told from fiscal day 1, April 1st through to February that we have no budget. Then on March 1st we will get told someone found a couple of million and we have 30 days to spend it.

and whatever you buy needs to be delivered by March 31st.

It's true madness.

barrylunch t1_j2em0h4 wrote on December 31, 2022 at 6:14 PM

It’s amazing that this type of systemic business and management incompetence is perpetuated decade after decade.

In virtually every other discipline, humanity makes improvements every year (processes, efficiency, technology, etc.)

Smashville66 t1_j2e7yuz wrote on December 31, 2022 at 4:40 PM

Every. Damn. Year. But if I tried to “overspend” on something necessary—knowing full well that the budget wasn’t going to be compromised in any way—I’d be scolded.

angrybird7677 OP t1_j2e2oq2 wrote on December 31, 2022 at 4:03 PM

This reason of "get smaller budget next yr if don't spend" seems to be the universal reason .. but it's honestly ridiculous

IAmJohnny5ive t1_j2eurud wrote on December 31, 2022 at 7:14 PM

It seems a bit crazy but part of the measure of success of a capitalist economy is how quickly money cycles around the economy. You might be spending on useless promo items but that money is paying your supplier and their employees and some of that flows back into government coffers straight away in payroll and sales taxes and more later on in company tax. The rest of that spins out into the economy as those employees spend on groceries and cars and xmas presents.

Think of it like how taps work - you have to keep a high level pressure in the water mains to ensure that when you turn on your kitchen tap that the water comes out immediately and with decent strength. Government Taxes and Spending functions like a pump for the economy in general. Taxes draws the money in and Budgets and their Spending pumps the money out

Smashville66 t1_j2ffxg1 wrote on December 31, 2022 at 9:46 PM

You know what? I’ve never really thought about that angle. It still drives me nuts, but you’re right.

mobotsar t1_j2fdavx wrote on December 31, 2022 at 9:27 PM

Why would the smaller budget be a problem though? If you're literally just buying random shit to get rid of money, you clearly didn't need that money in the first place.

Smashville66 t1_j2fgbfb wrote on December 31, 2022 at 9:49 PM

We didn’t in that particular budget cycle, for whatever reason. The budget was planned every year based on expected expenditures. Some expenses are more volatile than others.