Topic: Government Employees
“Since the turn of the 20th century, progressives have sought a system that could effectively select, train, reward, and guard from partisan influence the neutral scientific experts they believe are required to staff the national government and run the administrative state. Their U.S. system was initiated by the Pendleton Act of 188310 and institutionalized by the 1930s New Deal to set principles and practices that were meant to ensure that expert merit rather than partisan favors or personal favoritism ruled within the federal bureaucracy. Yet, as public frustration with the civil service has grown, generating calls to “drain the swamp,” it has become clear that their project has had serious unintended consequences.”
They have a real issue with staffing the government with nonpartisan experts. It follows logically that the alternative must be partisan bootlickers. While I can agree that the federal government is bloated in places and has its share of problems, I do not agree that the one of them is “too many politically neutral experts.”
Full contextual analysis of Section 1.3: Central Personnel Agencies: The Bureaucracy here.
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“Yet for the past 34 years, the U.S. civil service has been unable to distinguish consistently between strong and unqualified applicants for employment.”
That’s an interesting claim. I’m not saying that every government employee is “strong”, but to suggest that nobody who is currently in a position to hire government workers can tell the difference between “strong” and “unqualified” is fairly ludicrous. There’s a broad chasm between “strong” and “unqualified”, and it’s rather easy to tell the difference, even as I suspect that they’re about to argue that the government hiring managers are somehow bureaucratically handicapped from “knowing” this information.
Full contextual analysis of Section 1.3: Central Personnel Agencies: The Bureaucracy here.
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“As the Carter presidency was winding down, the U.S. Department of Justice and top lawyers at the OPM contrived with plaintiffs to end civil service IQ examinations because of concern about their possible impact on minorities.”
This is deliberately misleading. Civil Servants were subjected to a civil service exam, not an IQ test. And the exams were brought back starting in 2012. It is true that the Carter administration agreed to abolish it in 1981 after several discrimination cases. Under the Obama Administration, the OPM began to introduce an improved merit exam called USAHire (this is the one that was in test beginning in 2012.)
It’s interesting and telling that the authors would deliberately call it an IQ test when it isn’t, then point out that minorities were failing it. This is thinly veiled racism. They made a false statement about what kind of test it was, so that they could make an argument that minorities (must) have lower IQs, for no other reason but to be racist.
Full contextual analysis of Section 1.3: Central Personnel Agencies: The Bureaucracy here.
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“It is human nature that no one appreciates being told that he or she is less than outstanding in every way. Informing subordinates in a closely knit bureaucracy that they are not performing well is difficult. Rating compatriots is even considered rude and unprofessional. Moreover, managers can be and often are accused of racial or sexual discrimination for a poor rating, and this discourages honesty.”
Since when is “rating compatriots” – i.e., doing performance reviews in a professional setting – considered to be “rude and unprofessional”? Fact Check: “In a large number of these cases, it is common for an original discrimination allegation (on a basis other than retaliation) fail to establish a violation of the law, but the subsequent retaliation allegation results in a discrimination finding.” Source: EEOC.gov.
Full contextual analysis of Section 1.3: Central Personnel Agencies: The Bureaucracy here.
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“Both safety and justice demand that managers learn to act strategically to hire good and fire poor performers legally. The initial paperwork required to separate poor or abusive performers (when they are infrequently identified) is not overwhelming, and managers might be motivated to act if it were not for the appeals and enforcement processes.”
They’re arguing here for removing protections for federal workers to appeal unfair dismissals. “Poor performers” here is code for “people who disagree with our agenda.” “This (meaning these regulations and protections) keeps even the best managers from bringing cases in all but the most egregious cases of poor performance or misconduct.” (Project 2025, Section 1.3: Central Personnel Agencies: Managing the Bureaucracy, Donald Devine, Dennis Dean Kirk, and Paul Dans, page 107, paragraph 5.)
Full contextual analysis of Section 1.3: Central Personnel Agencies: The Bureaucracy here.
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“With the proper limitation of labor union actions, the FLRA should have limited reason for appeals. The EEOC’s federal employee section should be transferred to the MSPB, and many of the OCS’s investigatory functions should be returned to the OPM. The MSPB could then become the main reviewer of adverse actions, greatly simplifying the burdensome appeal process.”
Here, they’re arguing for limiting the ability for labor unions to protect workers’ rights, particularly in the areas of discrimination and fair labor practices.
Full contextual analysis of Section 1.3: Central Personnel Agencies: The Bureaucracy here.
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“…the Trump Administration issued Executive Order 1395724 to make career professionals in positions that are not normally subject to change as a result of a presidential transition but who discharge significant duties and exercise significant discretion in formulating and implementing executive branch policy and programs an exception to the competitive hiring rules and examinations for career positions under a new Schedule F.”
I wouldn’t blame you if your eyes crossed trying to make sense of that. This executive order was reversed by Biden. It is another mechanism for completely staffing the government with loyalists to the President and his agenda, not to the country.
Full contextual analysis of Section 1.3: Central Personnel Agencies: The Bureaucracy here.
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“Congress should also consider whether public-sector unions are appropriate in the first place. The bipartisan consensus up until the middle of the 20th century held that these unions were not compatible with constitutional government. After more than half a century of experience with public-sector union frustrations of good government management, it is hard to avoid reaching the same conclusion.”
Public-sector unions are a well-established and legally supported part of the labor landscape in the United States, and have been since 1962 when Kennedy signed EO #10988, granting federal employees the right to unionize. The authors are arguing for reversing this order.
Full contextual analysis of Section 1.3: Central Personnel Agencies: The Bureaucracy here.
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“The specific deficiencies of the federal bureaucracy – size, levels of organization, inefficiency, expense, and lack of responsiveness to political leadership – are rooted in the progressive ideology that unelected experts can and should be trusted to promote the general welfare in just about every area of social life.”
They’ve brought it back full-circle here to the idea that the government contains far too many experts in their fields and not nearly enough partisan loyalists. They’re attributing this to “progressive ideology” rather than simply common sense.
Full contextual analysis of Section 1.3: Central Personnel Agencies: The Bureaucracy here.
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“…the only real solution is for the national government to do less: to decentralize and privatize as much as possible and then ensure that the remaining bureaucracy is managed effectively along the lines of the enduring principles set out in detail here.”
Full contextual analysis of Section 1.3: Central Personnel Agencies: The Bureaucracy here.
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