438 Agencies?

There is no one Federal Government

There are the three main branches of Gubmint, Executive, Legislative and Judicial.  I hope we all learned that in high school.  At least I did, but perhaps our younger set didn't, preferring rather to play with their little phones and plan their next protest against the Freedom of Speech or their 2nd Amendment Rights.  

And below them are the 15 agencies that also are Cabinet-level appointees, such as Defense, Agriculture, Energy, Labor and Education.  And that's more or less all we mere peons ever get to see.  Just what's there in front of us at press conferences.  To which most of us pay little or no attention.

But below them are - ready for it? - 438 separate agencies.  Employing more than 1,800,000 busy little bees (one would hope!).  And one should, I believe, look at our Federal work force not as a group of folks united toward a common goal, all properly trained and managed and earning their bloated paychecks, but rather as members of disparate individual groups all doing exactly whatever the Hell they want.  In other words, not ONE Government, but a bunch of separate governments, all bumping into each other and overstepping each others' turf.

Let's take that last one, Education.  There are more than 4,000 Federal Department of Education employees in Washington, D. C.  And another 2,769 in the California State Education Department.  I'm sure there's a proportional number of state Ed workers in each of our other 49 states.

Now all that's nice, I'm sure, but we all agree that none of these Federal or State Education Department employees teaches a single, solitary class full of students.  Nor I doubt that they could.  Because they're employed to just push paper around on their desks.  But wouldn't we all agree that those who are closest to the issue, the challenge, the problem, are the ones most likely able to effectively handle it? 

As in, the teachers? 

And of course, these employees are on top of our County education boards, which oversee each individual school board.  There are more than 16,800 school districts overseeing more than 190,890 separate K-12 schools in America.  An average of some 2,600 students per school.  And why, I ask, do we need folks in the District of Columbia telling us how to educate our kids in Salina, Kansas, and Tempe, Arizona, and Little Rock, Arkansas, when we have local boards in each of those counties to establish the curricula and then assure it's followed, and county supervisory boards to make sure that they do?

Do we really need all these layers of bureaucracy?  Do we really need more than 200,000 highly-paid bureaucrats between our students and those who claim to supervise them,  instead of putting the money where it will make our kids better educated?  I think not.

I was told all of this when the Army first stationed me in the District of Columbia, and got to witness it first-hand.  Just think about this: Our taxpaying parents are shoveling out an immense dollar amount to get our single greatest Natural Resource, their kids, the right to a quality education.  For which they're paying dearly.  And getting bupkus in return.  

Did you know the average property taxes in Long Island, New York is $11,239 a year?  That's the average!  And roughly 77% of that breath-taking amount goes for - ready for it? - school taxes?  

They're paying for a good education for their kids, they're just not getting it.  They've finally figured out they're getting hosed, and so are their kids.  And that's a primary reason why New York residents (and CA's, too) are fleeing to Florida, and Tennessee, and Texas, and South Carolina, and so many other "Red" states which are delivering school choice and a DEI/CRT-free curricula.    

As I've been saying lo these many years now, it won't be too long before there's no one left here in Taxifornia but sign twirlers and Starbucks baristas.  Except it shant be long before those sign twirlers won't be able to afford those $8 cups of coffee...