Homeland Security Spends Billions for 14k Jobs

Jumping Captain · #1 04.12.2012, 11:36

	Quote:
	The US Department of Homeland Security, despite budget cuts and construction delays, is planning to add 17,000 employees into its consolidated headquarters in southeast Washington. The department broke groundat their new headquarters in 2009 and was originally scheduled for completion in 2016. The new complex is now scheduled for completion in 2022. The 4.5 million square-foot “federal mini-city for the Department of Homeland Security” on the site of the former infamous psychiatric St. Elizabeths Hospital and is the largest federal construction job since the pentagon was built in the 1940s. The construction of the project was originally expected to cost $3.4 billion but is now going to cost at least $4 billion and is expected to “create 16,000 direct construction jobs”. 14,000 employees were originally slated to work in the 170-acre complex. TheDHS currently has 22,000 personal working at over 40 buildings in the Washington D.C. area.

Source

How about that for spending in a time of counting pennies? Sure, that many new jobs is great... but doing what? Reading e-mails, listening to phone calls, invading the privacy!

Wonder where they are getting the money to build this complex... maybe here:

	Quote:
	Incredible as it sounds, civil asset forfeiture laws allow the government to seize property without charging anyone with a crime.

Source. And:

	Quote:
	Total assets, which present as of a specific time the amounts of future economic benefits owned or managed by the AFF/SADF, increased in FY 2011 to $6,869.6 million from $3,999.8 million in FY 2010, an increase of 71.7 percent.

Source... and that was in 2011. Whereas, 2012 has climbed even more now that Asset Forfeiture has become so popular in the US.

IMO yet another proof that the US Constitution is a thing of the past.
JC

Jobsrobertsharpii · #2 04.12.2012, 12:51

Why are you shocked?

Jumping Captain · #3 04.12.2012, 13:27

	Quote:	Jobsrobertsharpii
	Why are you shocked?

Not shocked at all... just passing around the news. Just heard something else at lunch news on DRS3... will start a new thread for that.
JC

marton · #4 04.12.2012, 16:17

I think there is some confusion here?

My take from the article is that

there will be 16K construction jobs created but only temporary until the building is complete in 2022.
Homeland Security will move 17K employees into the new building from other buildings in the area where tehy have 22K employees; there are no new jobs?

Jumping Captain · #5 04.12.2012, 16:27

	Quote:	marton
	I think there is some confusion here? My take from the article is that there will be 16K construction jobs created but only temporary until the building is complete in 2022. Homeland Security will move 17K employees into the new building from other buildings in the area where tehy have 22K employees; there are no new jobs?

Yes, 16k temporary jobs in construction. No confusion there.

Where does it say they will move 17k employees into the new building? I read the word "add", and it is pretty clear to me. I am not confused

JC

marton · #6 04.12.2012, 17:07

	Quote:	Jumping Captain
	Yes, 16k temporary jobs in construction. No confusion there. Where does it say they will move 17k employees into the new building? I read the word "add", and it is pretty clear to me. I am not confused JC

Maybe the person who wrote the article is confused?

A quick Google comes up with "In early 2007, the Department submitted a $4.1 billion plan to Congress to consolidate its 60-plus Washington-area offices into ......."

Anyway this very old "news"

Jobsrobertsharpii · #7 04.12.2012, 17:14

I rarely react to news of the US Federal government spending tremendous sums to achieve very meager results; its par for the course there now. With the incumbent being re-elected, we'll see much more of this, I'm afraid.

marton · #8 04.12.2012, 17:20

	Quote:	Jobsrobertsharpii
	I rarely react to news of the US Federal government spending tremendous sums to achieve very meager results; its par for the course there now. With the incumbent being re-elected, we'll see much more of this, I'm afraid.

I do not think you can blame the incumbent for decisions made a year before he was elected in 2008?

Or maybe you can? What do I know about US politics?

Jobsrobertsharpii · #9 04.12.2012, 17:21

	Quote:	marton
	I do not think you can blame the incumbent for decisions made a year before he was elected in 2008? Or maybe you can? What do I know about US politics?

I didn't blame him for this decision. I simply stated that I believe we will see more of this with him in office.

Jumping Captain · #10 04.12.2012, 17:26

	Quote:	Jobsrobertsharpii
	I didn't blame him for this* decision. I simply stated that I believe we will see more of this with him in office.*

... and thereafter.

Jobsrobertsharpii · #11 04.12.2012, 18:47

	Quote:	Jumping Captain
	... and thereafter.

Very true. The US Federal government was never intended to have grown so large, nor accumulated so much power. It hardly matters which major party for which one votes, as the elected officials are no longer in the driver's seat; this role has been passed to the nameless, faceless middle-management bureaucrats. The only difference between the parties is how fast and the mechanisms by which they enable the bureaucrats to expand their respective empires.

The last thing the US needs is more government, but Americans picked the candidate most likely to expand the bureaucracy and better enable government to accumulate more power to itself.