Photo by Jon Tyson on Unsplash
“Hi, Miss Laura. Did you sign that Adobe contract?” Rene asked. My service coordinator called to see if I signed the Service Detail Report regarding my CBS SDE form for DDD, so I can get paid by PPL.
Got that? Shall I translate that for you?
DDD is the state agency that distributes federal funds to individuals with a documented disability. After I spent over two years filling out paperwork for the federal government and DDD proving that my son does have autism and epilepsy, then the government passed the rest of the job — determining where all that money should go, creating disability programs, and distributing the money — onto private vendors.
Rene’s private company manages the paperwork. Some of my son’s money goes to me, as a private contractor who supports my son. A little goes to a private computer training company that teaches him how to program in C++. He’s on a waitlist to get funding for housing, which he could spend at one of two local housing programs that support low needs adults.
The privatization of government is happening. It’s happening across sectors, especially in two sectors that I know well — education and disability services. It is happening because the government services simply cannot manage the current level of demand for services. Small businesses and non-profits, more nimble and specialized, have stepped in fill that void. As a recipient of these services, I’m excited to see what entrepreneurs can develop.
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This has been happening for decades. The issues surrounding contracting out public services are complex, but they usually boil down to how much overhead costs, and how much surveillance they get from the state or other government entity contracting out the work.
I was an Army contracting officer who oversaw a portion of a large installation support contract in the 1980s–it was successful because we had a comprehensive surveillance plan and frequent inspections of the work performed.
Many current government contractors are under much less surveillance–see the meatpacking and airplane industry for examples. In my experience, the surveillance work is tough because expertise migrates to the contractor and away from the various inspection regimes, so it is tough to catch poor performance.
One of the largest contractors for the government is Centene, headquartered here in St Louis–it does Medicaid processing for dozens of states. Its CEO made millions–all paid for with our tax dollars.
Another example of contracting out services is charter schools. We have had many in St Louis, but half have closed over the past twenty years–mostly because they were not really schools but real estate schemes that went wrong. Of course, our Republican legislators have doubled down on them, just as they have doubled down on vouchers for private schools. In addition, Missouri allows the use of companies like Kelly for substitute teachers. Maybe this is a good idea, maybe not–but the state has also lowered the standards for substitute teachers–no degree required any more.
I think there are many areas where contracting can work well, but so far the results are mixed in the education sector.
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