By GottaLaff
Is there any area in which they didn't mislead us?
President George W. Bush's Labor Department misled Congress in an effort to prove outsourcing jobs to private companies was more efficient than assigning the jobs to government employees, according to a Government Accountability Office report released Monday.
The report (pdf here) found that the Department used fictional projected numbers to improve "savings reports" -- even when real numbers were already available. And when the government did find private firms to take a government job, that employee generally was either reassigned to another task with the same title or promoted.
The effort was called "competitive sourcing," aimed to increase government efficiency by having federal and private organizations compete for providing services. [...]
An investigation revealed, however, that the Labor Department -- under direction from Bush budget officials -- deliberately withheld information about true costs. [...]
The report noted that this approach was consistent with "guidance" given by the Administration's Office of Management and Budget.
In addition, the report found the Department's "savings reports" were "not reliable: a sample of three reports contained inaccuracies, and others used projections when actual numbers were available, which sometimes resulted in overstated savings."
Most workers were also demoralized as the government tried to find private firms to take over their jobs, the probe found. [...]
Since implementation, 22 employees were laid off or demoted, all of them African American.
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