Eric Cantor's YouCut

[Karin]

Link to Site

Have you participated in Eric Cantor's YouCut voting site?  Every so often, they post a poll where you would cut.  This time, it's about DOD issues.  Would you:

1)  Cut the printing budget, no more glossy presentation level jobs, when black & white 2-sided would do.  $36 million.

2)  Reduce the studies, analyses and evaluations.  $24 million. 

3)  Stop the automatic yearly raises for DOD employees that are "below satisfactory."  NOTE:  These would be defense civilian employees only.  $21 million. 

Dollar amounts are for one year only. 


I think I like no. 3 best, just on philosophical grounds.  No. 1 might harm the paper and printing industry, and No. 2, I'm not convinced saves any money unless you cut head count. 

[DefiantSix]

Where's the "All of the Above" box?  It would take doing all three and then moving on to the next target to even call these proposals a good start.

[RealConservativePatriot]

I proposed we cut farm subsidies, but there is more I'd like to cut.

[DumbAss Tanker]

#1, I'm fine with, DOD has always had a huge problem with austerity in how shit looks versus what the really need.  I could tell you some stomach-turning stories of the kind of things the 3ID CG wanted to spend money on when I deployed there.

#2, I don't get the 'Head count' comment, this doesn't really have anything to do with DOD population, it means studies of all sorts of esoteric contingencies; a lot of it is actually necessary/desirable like studying TBI effects or suicide reduction, or (In the case of DARPA) important foundational research.  Then again a lot of it is crap to keep money flowing and people busy, too.  SOME economy is certainly possible here.

#3, I don't have a problem with it, managers can deny step increases now for poor performers, they just normally don't because they have better things to do than spend the next three years in and out of bullshit EEOC hearings over trying to do it.  I don't have a problem with applying it to the seniority increases of underperforming UNIFORMED personnel, either, those are basically just the uniformed equivalent of the civil service step increases, and anyone who thinks all military personnel are executing their jobs perfectly, or even adequately in a lot of cases, is a total idiot.

[docstew]

#1, I'm fine with, DOD has always had a huge problem with austerity in how shit looks versus what the really need.  I could tell you some stomach-turning stories of the kind of things the 3ID CG wanted to spend money on when I deployed there.

#2, I don't get the 'Head count' comment, this doesn't really have anything to do with DOD population, it means studies of all sorts of esoteric contingencies; a lot of it is actually necessary/desirable like studying TBI effects or suicide reduction, or (In the case of DARPA) important foundational research.  Then again a lot of it is crap to keep money flowing and people busy, too.  SOME economy is certainly possible here.

#3, I don't have a problem with it, managers can deny step increases now for poor performers, they just normally don't because they have better things to do than spend the next three years in and out of bullshit EEOC hearings over trying to do it.  I don't have a problem with applying it to the seniority increases of underperforming UNIFORMED personnel, either, those are basically just the uniformed equivalent of the civil service step increases, and anyone who thinks all military personnel are executing their jobs perfectly, or even adequately in a lot of cases, is a total idiot.

two questions:
1) How would you go about recognizing who is underperforming? NCOER/OER ratings, i.e. a 3/3 or lower gets two years of service not counted for pay? Some other mechanism?

2) Doesn't the centralized promotion system already do this by not promoting the weak performers, which incentivizes good performance rather than punishing poor performance? Admittedly, you are correct about some military leaders not being adequate.

[DumbAss Tanker]

two questions:
1) How would you go about recognizing who is underperforming? NCOER/OER ratings, i.e. a 3/3 or lower gets two years of service not counted for pay? Some other mechanism?

Apparently nobody has a problem figuring out who doesn't deserve a step increase if they're civilians based on unstated criteria, but that presumably would mean ratings for them, so whatever concept applies for one applies to the other, but it could also include those with non-discharge-generating UCMJ actions.  Structurally, yes, it would mean an unsatisfactory E6 with 10 years of actual service would be getting paid at the E6 over 8 pay rate.

2) Doesn't the centralized promotion system already do this by not promoting the weak performers, which incentivizes good performance rather than punishing poor performance? Admittedly, you are correct about some military leaders not being adequate.

If you don't think the centralized promotions punish people for poor performance, you've obviously never heard of QMP.  There are upsides and downsides to centralized promotion, of course the services never talk about the latter.  The most obvious upside is that it levels the playing field, but the big downsides are that it encourages very risk-adverse leadership, and block-checking on things that are often totally irrelevant to the current job and unit of assignment.