New Insourcing Rules Go Down with Withdrawn Appropriations Bill

Yesterday, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) was forced to pull the $1.1 trillion fiscal 2011 Appropriations Omnibus bill off the Senate calendar. The bill’s demise not only takes more than $8 billion in earmarks, over $1 billion in healthcare reform funding, and $158 billion for the war in Afghanistan off the table, it also imperils new rules that would have required federal agencies to step up efforts to make sure certain kinds of jobs are not being contracted out to the private sector.

The provision (Section 741 of the bill) would have required agencies to report what they have done to convert jobs that were outsourced to contractors and bring them in-house for performance by federal employees. Such efforts would not only pertain to so-called inherently governmental functions, which are jobs that only federal employees can do, but also work considered “closely associated” with inherently governmental functions and even work deemed “critical” to an agency’s mission.

Contractor trade groups quickly pounced on the provision, calling it an open invitation for wanton, indiscriminate insourcing which would kill jobs, cripple the government, and probably lead to dogs and cats living together and mass hysteria.

Contractors will probably be spared this disaster of biblical proportions. Aside from the scuttled appropriations bill, there is speculation that the new Congress will severely curtail the Obama administration’s insourcing initiative. The opening salvo in the battle could take place in just a few weeks when the Office of Federal Procurement Policy (OFPP) releases new guidelines on work that should be performed by federal employees.

-- Neil Gordon

See also:

• Federal Service Contract Inventories: A Failure to Address Which Contracts Are Cost Justified
• Small Legislative Victory Heralds Brighter Days Ahead for Contractors
• Col. T.X. Hammes Says Private Security Contractors Perform "Inherently Governmental" Functions
• It's About Time: The House Passes Legislation to Disclose Additional Information about Federal Service Contracts

Comments

[Posted on: Dec 29, 2010 at 06:42 PM]

Spare me all the whining! Oh, you poor thing, did you get called a fascist? You know the word fascists doesn't mean "bad people". It does have an actual meaning. It is a form of socialism where people who have government connections get paid money collected at gun point from taxpayers such as myself to provide processes rather than products. Does that sound familiar, Mr. Fascist? Words have meanings, and when their meanings apply to you, so does the word. Wow, what a concept!

Here's an idea. If you want to be a real capitalist, why don't you take your own money and develop a product? Then you can market your product in the free market place and if your product actually has merit, then you EARN money. Yeah, why do that when you can cash in on your government buddies?

[Posted on: Dec 26, 2010 at 09:25 AM]

DFENS,There’s really no need to start with the personal insults …calling me a “Leech” or a "Fascist" doesn’t help our debate here and only proves that you don’t really understand the “Public vs Private”/A-76/Insourcing problem.
When you comment on this subject , please back it up with facts, provide examples, even a few hyperlinks for relevant articles.
After all, we wouldn’t want anyone thinking you were just another Internet Troll looking for Forum arguments now would we ?
Back to our topic –
It looks like our Government has recognized that their Insourcing policy was flawed …the “unintended consequences” were having a negative impact on Small Businesses.
This came out 3 days ago -- http://www.govexec.com/dailyfed/1210/122210rb1.htm

[Posted on: Dec 24, 2010 at 07:19 PM]

Sell your fascism somewhere else. The government should pay for results only. If leaches like you want a piece of our tax dollars it should only be through a true commercial contract where you contractor leaches have some skin in the game and all the risk isn't passed on to the US taxpayer! The sooner this fascist gravy train ends the better off the nation will be. Play your party politics with someone else. I'm an American first.

[Posted on: Dec 21, 2010 at 10:45 AM]

Listen to the Contracting Officers--
http://www.govexec.com/mailbagDetails.cfm?aid=46522
The system is flawed ..you can't blame small Business.

[Posted on: Dec 21, 2010 at 10:15 AM]

DFENS QUOTE - "Private businesses do business in the commercial marketplace. They don't leach off the government carcass!"
---------
So , you think we all "Feed Off The Gov Carcass" ?? And that's how you view our Gov ..a "Carcass"? ...nice :) I can tell you've never owned a small Business or ever had to deal with a Contracting Office and wait 1 year to be paid (without Interest). The problem is not with the Vendors ..it’s the incompetent Contracting Officers who continue to make awards to Contractors who should have been blocked from ever Bidding.
I noticed you didn't Capitalize the first letters of socialism or fascism , but you DID capitalize Communism each time.
That alone shows your Political leanings.
Try to have a Merry Christmas Comrade !

[Posted on: Dec 20, 2010 at 08:52 AM]

"President Obama and Congress are trying to take more jobs from private businesses through "insourcing," which means taking contracts from private firms and giving the work to government employees."

Private businesses do business in the commercial marketplace. They don't leach off the government carcass! They don't make 100% of their income off the US taxpayer! And here's one for you, they actually make a profit off of providing the best product for the best price instead of making a profit off of how well they kiss-ass or payoff government officials. Private companies get rewarded for taking risks instead of getting rewarded for sloth and incompetence.

What you advocate is not capitalism and it has nothing to do with "free markets". This crony capitalism that the Republicans are so fond of with thier outsourcing of government functions follows the fascist economic model. That is, the govenrment determines what is produced and leaves it to privately owned companies to do their bidding. These so-called "private" companies do not shoulder any risk for their reward, they are merely compensated for their political connections.

Fascism is the least desireable form of socialism, far worse than Communisim, because with that form of socialism "the workers" have to support not only a bloated government bureacracy, but also have to support an elite upper class of these well connected "private" company owners. In Communisim the workers only have to support the govenrment bureacracy. The appeal of fascism in Europe in the '30s was that it supported the well connected aristocracy Europeans were used to having instead of killing these leaches the way Communist purges tended to do.

[Posted on: Dec 18, 2010 at 10:20 AM]

Gordon ..Do you think this is funny as well ? --
http://nanhayworth.com/pdfs/washexam_article_insourcing.pdf

Read up on the subject before you start with the sarcasm.