The rules are supposed to promote low cost through competition.
Three problems:
Government employees are expert at manipulating the rules to make their life easy, which usually means making it hard for a new supplier to displace an incumbent
Dealing with the government is a BIG hassle. There are a lot of forms to fill out, and actually getting paid is surprisingly difficult and time-consuming. Because of the time and effort, it is generally not worth dealing with the goverment at all unless it provides a major part of one's business
The specific proposals in the article would probably fall foul of legal requirements that a product or service may not be sold to the government at a higher price than it's sold to anyone else (this is despite the higher costs of selling to the government).
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Has the author ever sold anything to the govt?
Posted by: nomad47 on April 03, 2003 04:57 PMThree problems:
- Government employees are expert at manipulating the rules to make their life easy, which usually means making it hard for a new supplier to displace an incumbent
- Dealing with the government is a BIG hassle. There are a lot of forms to fill out, and actually getting paid is surprisingly difficult and time-consuming. Because of the time and effort, it is generally not worth dealing with the goverment at all unless it provides a major part of one's business
- The specific proposals in the article would probably fall foul of legal requirements that a product or service may not be sold to the government at a higher price than it's sold to anyone else (this is despite the higher costs of selling to the government).
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