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Mark Cuban offers to fund former 18F employees

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Re: Mark Cuban offers to fund former 18F employees

#151

Post by deadbabe »

mharrig1 wrote: post #3

So Mark Cuban wants to lean into exactly what DOGE is pushing by putting himself in the middle of the Governmental to Private shift? That doesn't surprise me and gives more evidence that Cuban is not dissimilar to Musk, just that he has much better PR.

There really isn’t another option. They aren’t going to get those government jobs back, so they might as well go private. Otherwise, they’ll just be unemployed and have to find work doing some other thing somewhere. Short of becoming President and reinstating this stuff what else is he supposed to do?

Re: Mark Cuban offers to fund former 18F employees

#152

Post by spwa4 »

IgorPartola wrote: post #73
modeless wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The difference is private companies that accumulate too much waste and useless things can fail and be replaced. The exception is companies propped up by government regulation. The problem with modern big companies is that the exception has become the rule. Regulation is so pervasive it's become a "what the hell is water" situation. People don't even recognize that the dysfunctional companies are protected from failur…

A company that makes birthday party banners that fails can be replaced. If your electric company runs itself into the ground, there is no replacement without government assistance. So why add the overhead of a for profit company?

Because a million things can be replaced. An electricity company can use private contractors (either individual or with lots of small regional companies) for maintenance, build, diagnosing, private power plants, ... and these can fail and be replaced independently, even if the power company as a whole cannot.

Re: Mark Cuban offers to fund former 18F employees

#153

Post by SpaceL10n »

_fat_santa wrote: post #131
SpaceL10n wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Could share why privatization of 18f is good in your eyes? When I heard about the creation of 18f and USDS all those years ago, I remember thinking, finally! It was embarrassing and frankly disheartening to have such crucial public websites and services be so behind the times. Especially when Silicon Valley, the cradle of technical innovation, lied within our borders. Then comes along 18f and all the good work they d…

I guess I should clarify my stance: I think that 18f going private is a good thing _given_ they are being dissolved. I of course would prefer if they stayed inside the govt but if it's between continuing to exist as private entity vs not existing at all, I'll take the former.

Gotcha thank you for the response

Re: Mark Cuban offers to fund former 18F employees

#154

Post by pseudocomposer »

mattbrewsbytes wrote: post #19

Privatization is what a lot of people believe is the answer, thinking that there is so much waste and useless things the Federal government does. These people must have never worked at a large corporation. I have a relative in the federal government and we would share stories because the dysfunctions are basically the same. Any large organization of humans working uses a pyramid organization since like the middle age…

We’ve had it all along: small businesses and city/county governments.

What we’re missing is a willingness/ability to break up overreaching corporations and states. We used to be better about it - see 19th-century Europe, especially France - but fighting back obviously has costs.

Centralized power isn’t great at supporting human life, but it’s very good at dominating human life. So large corporations and states have been bedfellows and dominated us for the last century or so by greatly elevating the cost of actually fighting back against their united power.

Re: Mark Cuban offers to fund former 18F employees

#155

Post by jancsika »

llamaimperative wrote: post #38
JansjoFromIkea wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

yeah I had to step back from this when I saw it* on my feed because I was so disenchanted by how positive the replies were. Not even sure what their issues with DOGE are if they think this is a great solution... ETA: I'm on about his bluesky post, to be clear, not this thread

I don’t think anyone who “likes” this solution thinks “it’s a great solution” I reckon approximately 100% of those people would prefer 18F stay how it is

> I don’t think anyone who “likes” this solution thinks “it’s a great solution”

It's not a solution.

If we're talking about the current administration, there's no way in hell they're going to contract with a consultancy made up of gov't employees they just fired. If they do hire consultants they'll be ones who are loyal to Musk.

If we're talking about a future administration that wants to show intent to repair the damage done to gov't workers and services, why in the world would that admin start by privatizing 18F?

Re: Mark Cuban offers to fund former 18F employees

#156

Post by cmrdporcupine »

mopsi wrote: post #115
cmrdporcupine wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Reagan or not, what you can see clearly in the comments here and many other places is that what would be considered fairly extreme libertarian talking points have become common parlance these days. Taxation as "theft", the necessity of the threat of termination and other economic deprivation in order to coerce people to doing good work, the assumption that profit inevitably produces more efficiency, and that efficien…

The Ayn Rand types deserve to be reminded that she spent her final years on welfare.

I mean the easy libertarian response to this would be I imagine them saying "well, she was force to pay into it, she would have a right to partake of it" and they're not wrong.

"Gotcha" hypocrisy arguments about personal behaviour I don't think are great taken from either left nor right.

Re: Mark Cuban offers to fund former 18F employees

#158

Post by specialp »

kingstoned wrote: post #32
dzonga wrote: post #15

18f has(d) really smart people. who gave up higher wages in the private sector to serve the public. then idiots like musk come along. damage from musk n co will be monumental in the years to come.

It's generally a myth that government employees are somehow receiving low total compensation and they could do better in the real economy. Here's one government employees providing stats and experiences about what it is like to work for the government: https://www.betonit.ai/p/the-joy-of-government-employment

It is exceedingly rare to make over 200k in govt. Most heads of agencies and other high level roles are GS-15 which tops out around 195k

What you USED to get in exchange for less salary was stability as government jobs were viewed as less vulnerable to economic cycles and uncertainty. Now that value prop is gone

Re: Mark Cuban offers to fund former 18F employees

#159

Post by skissane »

lesuorac wrote: post #48
kingstoned wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's generally a myth that government employees are somehow receiving low total compensation and they could do better in the real economy. Here's one government employees providing stats and experiences about what it is like to work for the government: https://www.betonit.ai/p/the-joy-of-government-employment

> Oh yeah, and I’m a government employee of the state of Virginia I mean this thread is on the federal government not state governments so your link isn't really relevant. Federal government employees cannot make more than the VP ($235,100). So if you know a role that pays more than that it pays less in the federal government. (There is some hand wavey-ness around locale pay and stuff but we're not talking 2x).

> Federal government employees cannot make more than the VP ($235,100). So if you know a role that pays more than that it pays less in the federal government. (There is some hand wavey-ness around locale pay and stuff but we're not talking 2x)

Medical specialists (certain types thereof) and surgeons employed by the federal government (VA, DOD, etc) commonly earn $3xx,xxx or even $4xx,xxx - which is less than they’d get in the private sector - I’m pretty sure some of the more highly paid ones are getting at least double the VP’s salary (but not all the non-salary perks the VP gets, like a 33 room mansion)

VA base salaries max out at $400K, but I believe you can get much higher into the 400s, even into the 500s potentially, with market pay / allowances / etc - https://www.va.gov/OHRM/Pay/2024/PhysicianDentist/PayTables....

Re: Mark Cuban offers to fund former 18F employees

#160

Post by cromulent »

enlightenedfool wrote: post #42
mattbrewsbytes wrote: post #19

Privatization is what a lot of people believe is the answer, thinking that there is so much waste and useless things the Federal government does. These people must have never worked at a large corporation. I have a relative in the federal government and we would share stories because the dysfunctions are basically the same. Any large organization of humans working uses a pyramid organization since like the middle age…

[flagged]

> Private organization funds itself.

A pertinent example would be Tesla. They shipped approximately 100 cars a month in 2009-2010, with the chassis made by Lotus.

They received a $465 million loan from the Department of Energy in 2009 ("people’s hard earned money") to invest in a production plant to make their own cars and batteries. They did so, and launched the Model S a couple of years later.

They paid the loan back in 2013 with 13 million of interest (quite attractive rates, really).

Looking at the wealth that was generated on the back of such a loan, one can only think the government should have taken equity, rather than a percentage point of interest.

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