05.17.17

Enzi: Make Federal Government More Effective and Efficient for Taxpayers

CBO and GAO Find Feds Spending on High Salaries, Improper Payments

WASHINGTON D.C. – During a hearing today focused on running the government for less, Senator Mike Enzi (R-WY), Chairman of the Senate Budget Committee, said Congress can make the federal government more effective and efficient. Testifying were the Congressional Budget Office (CBO), which found a disconnect between the salaries paid to federal workers and those received by private sector counterparts with similar training and experience, and the Government Accountability Office (GAO), which found more than $144 billion in improper payments last year. 

“It’s important for Congress to ask if we are using taxpayer dollars wisely, and operating the government as efficiently and effectively as the managers of a private sector company would,” said Chairman Enzi.  “Imagine how much could we save if the government effectively leveraged its economies of scale to purchase information systems and various other goods and services? We must identify ways that the government can operate in a more efficient and cost-effective manner.”

Enzi noted that GAO informed Congress that, in the normal course of business, the U.S. Treasury now issues more than $100 billion in improper payments each year. Ninety-three percent of the $144 billion in improper payments issued last year were overpayments, in which we sent money to individuals or entities that either got more than they were supposed to or weren’t supposed to get it. Enzi said this equaled more than $1 trillion in improper payments reported since 2003. 

“We can better align federal employees’ compensation with counterparts in the private sector, so that we are neither underpaying nor overpaying different types of federal employees, but rather compensating individuals appropriately, and in accord with their skills, training, experience and work product,” Chairman Enzi said.  “It is time to make the federal government more efficient and effective for hardworking taxpayers.”

 

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