Governmental Inefficiency

Over the past two weeks I have been boldly reminded of how inefficient our governmental institutions can be.

Last weekend was Tax Free Tennessee weekend. 1st off it's a 9.25% off sale, when was the last time you got excited about a sale that was less than 10%? What makes it nuts is the list of items excluded/included. It is the most convoluted, confusing list you have ever seen. I know other states have this sale and I imagine their lists are equally as crazy but when you realize that someone had to put together a list and that list had to be revised and then approved it helps you understand why they get nothing done in the legislative halls. This is some seriously time consuming shit.

The .pdf list says things like:

• Tool belts & belt buckles are taxable but belts are not
• You can buy formal clothing (wedding dress/tux) including garters/garter belts, girdles, bras, and corsets w/o paying tax but you can't rent them

The other crazy thing this week is that Tara went back to school, as a counselor she has to be there before everybody else to get class schedules and new students ready. Well Metro Schools has a computer system that seems to have cracked under pressure everyday this week and the IT people say things like "there are too many people using the system" and things like that apparently not remembering that this week EVERY year EVERY school in the district is using the system because, oh, I don't know, maybe because school starts Monday and the kids need schedules and the teachers need rosters. Shouldn't the system be designed for this type of pressure? Do engineers say a bridge has too much traffic if the bridge was created to handle the standard daily amount of traffic? I mean, there aren't any more schools now than there were last year and maybe only a few more than when the system was installed about 3 years ago. Did they not make the system to handle this amount of work? If not why? It's sad and distressing that

1. people can't get the work they are paid to do during their regular work hours
2. tax payers are paying for a system that can't handle the current load and obviously it won't be able to handle a future load.

Let's get rid of them all and start over!

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