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I really enjoyed this article. The DDS is literally doing the same kind of things that the USDS is doing, but for military applications. Given the fact that the
by zachruss92 8y ago
I really enjoyed this article. The DDS is literally doing the same kind of things that the USDS is doing, but for military applications. Given the fact that the largest portion of our taxes goes towards defense spending, initiatives like create opportunities to allocate resources more efficiently, iterate with agility, and save a ton of money.
When you look at DoD contractors, there is obviously a motivation on their end to have larger contracts with inflated budgets and prolonged timelines - they're businesses. On the flip side, a government agency has none of those motivations - they just want to save lives as quickly and affordably as possible.
I am curious to see if these "lean" organizations will pop up in other parts of the federal/state/local governments. There are so many areas where better UX, logical efficiency, or inner-department communication could make people's lives easier or even save them:
- In PA you need to sign up for a tax ID separately from filing articles of incorporation. Why can't the Department of State and Department of revenue's system sync up to create a tax ID at the time of incorporation?
- Philadelphia's transit authority SEPTA has been rolling out a cashless fare system using RFID/NFC. It was supposed to be released in 2013 and still isn't complete. It cost $300 Million for Xerox to build which was twice as much as the initial budget. The kicker is their website used isn't even functional on mobile - it _literally_ uses nested tables for layout. A more efficient way to do this would be to use your phone for everything (using built in NFC) and an app to manage your fares.
- arkis22 8y agoThe largest portion of our taxes does not go to defense spending. It goes to entitlements.
- wmeredith 8y agoAbsolutely. 62% of the budget goes to social security, Medicare, and Medicaid. The rest is discretionary spending and a bit more than half of that goes to “defense”. Source: https://www.thebalance.com/u-s-federal-budget-breakdown-3305789 https://www.thebalance.com/u-s-federal-budget-breakdown-3305...
- adventured 8y agoThat's just the federal budget. US taxes & spending include local + state + federal. Leaving off the other $3.x trillion in taxation & spending, nearly an entire other federal government, paints a very incomplete picture. The military is 10% of all government spending in the US. Total government spending is around $7.2 trillion for 2018.
- mgkimsal 8y agoGoing out on a limb here to bet that whatever website they did develop doesn't fare well on accessibility standards...
- joejerryronnie 8y agoI bet their localization efforts are woefully lacking as well!
- rtkwe 8y agoPhiladelphia's transit authority SEPTA has been rolling out a cashless fare system using RFID/NFC. It was supposed to be released in 2013 and still isn't complete. It cost $300 Million for Xerox to build which was twice as much as the initial budget. The kicker is their website used isn't even functional on mobile - it _literally_ uses nested tables for layout. A more efficient way to do this would be to use your phone for everything (using built in NFC) and an app to manage your fares. NFC still isn't 100% available on all smartphones and really wasn't whenever the system was designed. Particularly the cheaper smartphones used by lower income people are more likely to not have NFC even today. Back in 2010 when the system was first conceived (assuming based on 2013 release date) NFC was even rarer.