USDA misses the point
By Bill Allison Jul 20 2009 4:11 p.m. 2 commentsMatt Drudge has linked a dozen or so examples of what look to be wasteful spending in the stimulus--$2,531,600 for 'HAM, WATER ADDED, COOKED, FROZEN, SLICED, 2-LB', $1,191,200 for '2 POUND FROZEN HAM SLICED' (I linked that one immediately below), $351,807 for 'REPLACE AND UPGRADE THE DUMBWAITER, $1,562,568 for 'MOZZARELLA CHEESE'... and so on. In response, the U.S. Dept. of Agriculture posted the following clarifying information:
The references to "2 pound frozen ham sliced" are to the sizes of the packaging. Press reports suggesting that the Recovery Act spent $1.191 million to buy "2 pounds of ham" are wrong. In fact, the contract in question purchased 760,000 pounds of ham for $1.191m, at a cost of approximately $1.50 per pound.
So why didn't the contract description on Recovery.gov list that amount. Taxpayers can't follow every penny if government doesn't tell us how much of a thing it's buying, or, as Drudge does, comparison shop.
Incomplete data doesn't do anyone any good. Recovery.gov will be a failure if every item requires a clarifying press release.
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The "Comparison" is ridiculous. Besides the fact that they bought slices sandwich meat, If you walked into food-lion and said you'd like to buy 1 Million Hams they'd laugh you out the store. Promotions are meant to bring people in to by other more expensive things.
I know it's a ridiculous comparison (also, the government ham was apparently boneless, so we're not even talking about the same item). The key thing is, without a unit price, you have no idea whether money is being spent wisely or not. If you see the government paying $6,000 for hammers, it helps to know whether they're getting 10 or 1000 of them.I thought Drudge's approach to the data was too gotcha -- USASpending.gov is full of similarly unenlightening descriptions of what the government is buying, and within ten minutes of looking around I'm sure I can come up with a dozen or so other examples where it looks like the government is spending millions for a can of creamed corn -- but it does highlight a serious problem with the data. As citizens, we need to keep a close on what government is doing, and that means getting useful information from government. None of the entries Drudge linked were particularly useful. Take a look at this one -- can you tell me, from the information provided, whether this is a good deal for taxpayers? $1 million plus to "REPAIR HVAC BUILDING 445 - CIVIL ENGINEERING (GROUND SOURCE HEAT PUMP)."