FMCSA and the Sequester

Posted on February 22, 2013 
Filed Under IN THE NEWS, POLITICS

In the coming days, you will hear increasingly more hysterical cries from the media and the government about the pending $85 billion worth of spending cuts scheduled to go into effect on March 1. Please note, the entire 2012 Federal budget is roughly $3.8 trillion, so this is approximately 2.5% of the entire budget. Also, keep in mind, the 2012 defecit in the budget is about $1.3 trillion, so $85 billion divided by $1.3 trillion is about 6.5% of the amount we owe. I took my numbers from Wikipedia, which seems to be as good a place as any for this sort of thing.

Put in terms we understand, we make $24,690 a year. We are spending $37,960 a year. We are borrowing $13,270 a year, to make up the difference. If you add in all the other years, where we borrowed money to cover our extra spending, and our credit card debt is $166,122. In a not-so-desperate effort to pay our debts, we have decided to cut our spending by $850 this year. We are eliminating one night out a month, and dropping the premium channels from our cable package. This will save us roughly $850. Mind you, we will still be in debt by $12,420 this year, but hey, it’s a start, right?

But the government cannot do that. They cannot give up their premium channels. They cannot give up eating out at Olive Garden every night. To hear them tell it, if this $85 billion is taken from them, there will be chaos and devastation in the streets. Actually do you know what will happen when the $85 billion is cut from the government?

Nothing. Absolutely nothing. The sun will rise, you will go to work, and everything will go on, just as normal. That’s the real reason the government is desperate to keep these cuts from happening. They are afraid if you find out that the sky really does not fall when you cut the government, you may want to do more of it.

Now as for our friends at FMCSA, weep not for them. Apparently, they will be almost entirely unaffected from the budget cuts, as almost all of their funding comes from the Highway Trust Fund, which is for some reason, is immune to these budget cuts.

One final point on the immense size of the government. I found a snippet of testimony before the House from one of DOT’s budget people in 1999. The DOT man testifying said FMCSA (it was called the Office of Motor Carriers back then) had an operating budget of $48.9 million in 1995, and employed 659 people. In 2012, their operating budget was $239.8 million, and they employed 1,179 people. Even if you account for inflation, in the past 18 years, the FMCSA has tripled in size.

Tripled! Are there 3 times less accidents happening? Are there 3 times less truck drivers being killed? I doubt it. You could very easily reduce the FMCSA’s budget by at least 20%, and the motoring public would not know the difference.

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