Dan J. Harkey

Master Educator | Business & Finance Consultant | Mentor

Inside America’s Battle to Restore an Accountable Government: The Coming Clean Up:

Subtitle: The Bloated Bureaucracy Reckoning- How the New Mandate of Tackling Waste, Fraud, and Abuse Is Reshaping Washington.

by Dan J. Harkey

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Summary

Washington’s administrative state, institutions, and Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs)didn’t grow by accident; they calcified over decades into a culture of monopoly power, duplicative mandates, and unaccountable processes. The moment is ripe to scrub it down to size—to consolidate, simplify, and restore accountability without sacrificing mission.

A Government That Forgot Its Customer

They did not forget- That is a mistake.  They never cared about the American public, but their only growth has been in size and power.

For years, Americans have navigated a maze of overlapping rules, slow approvals, and costly compliance.  The result isn’t merely frustration; it’s a drag on productivity, investment, and trust.  The federal budget alone shows the stakes: outlays are projected at around $7.0 trillion in FY2025, with a deficit of $1.8–$1.9 trillion—levels far above the 50-year average deficit share of GDP.

 “Accountability isn’t anti-government; it’s pro-public.”

Scrub‑a‑Dub‑Dub—What Needs Cleaning

Bloat and duplication.  Many agencies operate with redundant mandates and layered oversight that slow decisions and diffuse responsibility.  That’s not ideological—it’s managerial.  Even independent analysts have urged aggressive rightsizing of the federal real estate footprint and overhead.  A 2023 GAO review found 17 of 24 headquarters used, on average, 25% or less of their capacity during sampled weeks—evidence of costly underutilization.  Subsequent analysis by the Public Buildings Reform Board placed average D.C. HQ utilization near 12% in 2023.

Process inefficiency.  GSA now requires agencies to report occupancy and utilization biweekly to support consolidation decisions—an overdue but essential data discipline.

Work patterns, reality vs. rhetoric.  Despite viral claims that “almost no one” returned to federal offices, the picture is more nuanced.  OPM’s 2024 telework report and follow-up data show a minority of employees are fully remote (≈9–10%), with most telework-eligible staff still working the majority of hours in person; broader U.S. data show telework at roughly 23% of workers during 2024.  In short, hybrid is the norm, not absenteeism.

Follow the Money: Deficits, Debt, and Incentives

With outlays projected at around $7.0T and revenues at about $5.2T this year, the gap is structural, driven by mandatory programs and rapidly rising net interest costs.  CBO estimates debt held by the public at ~100% of GDP in FY2025 and rising.  These aren’t partisan figures; they’re the scoreboard that frames every policy choice.  [

Lobbying reinforces inertia.  Washington’s lobbying ecosystem is gigantic: ~12–13k registered lobbyists (with far more influence practitioners outside formal registration) and billions in annual spend.  That scale tilts policymaking toward status quo complexity rather than simplification.

When Industrial Policy Meets Market Reality

Case study: EV subsidies and loans.  Public support for strategic industries is not new, but execution matters.  In January 2025, the Department of Energy closed a $6.57 billion loan (principal ≈ $5.975B plus capitalized interest) with Rivian to build a Georgia plant for mid-size EVs (R2/R3), targeting 400,000 units of capacity and ~7,500 jobs over time.  Whether that proves prudent depends on execution, demand, and timing.  The policy should include clear milestones, clawbacks, and rigorous oversight—especially when prior cost curves or losses raise flags.

Civil Service Reform Without the Spoils

The Civil Service is neither civil nor service-oriented and provides little beyond a self-serving, monopoly-driven structure that demands payments.

Calls to restructure the civil service—including versions of “Schedule F” to reclassify policy-influencing roles as at-will—are back.  Proponents argue that presidents need policy responsiveness; critics warn that it could politicize the merit system.  Early 2025 reporting indicated plans to reclassify tens of thousands of positions, with estimates often clustering around 50,000 roles.  Any serious reform should protect due process for career professionals while streamlining performance management and clarifying accountability for policy execution.

A Practical Scrub Plan

To shrink costs without shrinking mission, pursue a balanced, staged reform:

·       Inventory and consolidate.
Use GSA/OMB occupancy reporting to merge underutilized locations, prioritize divestiture of obsolete facilities, and adopt 150 USF/person design standards in the future.  Tie the square footage to documented in-person needs, not the historical footprint.

·       One‑in, two‑out for duplicative rules.
For every new rule, sunset two legacy regs that cover the same risk with lower effectiveness.  Maintain a public duplication map so businesses can see which superseded rules no longer apply (a high-trust, low-friction approach).

·       Lean approvals.
Implement shot clocks for permits and licensing, with automatic escalation (not automatic approval) on day X; publish cycle-time dashboards by agency and region to drive competition on service levels.

·       Rightsize headcount via attrition and redeployment.
For roles tied to processes slated for consolidation, offer retraining into high‑need functions (cybersecurity, adjudication backlogs, procurement), and rely on attrition rather than blunt RIFs. Make performance management real—fast, fair, and reviewable.

·       Sunset subsidies with milestones.
For industrial policy tools (grants/loans/tax credits), set clear operating and cost milestones; if missed, ratchet down benefits or trigger clawbacks.  The Rivian loan’s phased structure and production milestones are the kind of guardrails taxpayers should expect—and demand elsewhere.

·       Expanding disclosure and posting real-time meeting logs will empower citizens and officials, fostering transparency and accountability.

What “Winning” Looks Like in 24 Months

  • Space & spend: Measurable reductions in unused office space (starting with D.C.) and a shift toward modern, smaller footprints near where people actually work—saving O&M and lease dollars.
  • Cycle‑time gains: Median permit/licensing timelines cut by 25–40% in pilot programs, publicly tracked.
  • Regulatory clarity: Duplicative rules pruned, with a visible “what changed” registry.
  • Workforce health: A hybrid‑by‑design civil service, with remote appropriate for some roles, but in-person collaboration targeted to mission needs—guided by OPM/OMB metrics instead of blanket slogans.
  • Fiscal nudges: Marginal improvements to the primary deficit via lower overhead and fewer rent-seeking carve-outs—modest on their own, but meaningful as part of a broader budgetary program. 

The Cultural Reset

This isn’t about “burning it down.” It’s about “shrinking the hell out of it-like 50%.  It’s about earning back trust through competence, candor, and measurable service.  When agencies streamline approvals, publish metrics, and live within modern footprints, they signal respect for the public’s time and money.  That’s the real scrub‑a‑dub‑dub: less foam, more rinse—and a government that emerges cleaner, lighter, and more accountable.

Sources

American Bureaucratic History (targeted, political)

Examples include:

  • The Progressive Era expansion (1880s–1910s)
    Creation of the Interstate Commerce Commission (ICC), the USDA, and early federal regulatory bodies.
  • New Deal Bureaucracy (1933–1939)
    The alphabet‑soup agencies: NRA, AAA, WPA, CCC—rapid expansion of federal administrative authority.
  • Great Society Programs (1960s)
    HEW expansion, Medicare/Medicaid bureaucracy, Office of Economic Opportunity.
  • Post‑Watergate Reforms (1974–1978)
    Inspector General Act, FOIA expansion, Civil Service Reform Act.

Global, Cross-Civilization Bureaucratic Lessons

Examples include:

  • Imperial China’s Scholar‑Bureaucrats (2,000 years of institutional inertia).
  • The Ottoman Devşirme/Janissary bureaucracy, which eventually calcified into Corruption.
  • The British Colonial Civil Service, whose administrative layers often outlasted their purpose.
  • Soviet administrative bloat, where mid-level functionaries (“nomenklatura”) wielded absolute power.