4 ms·

the FAA enforces strict deadlines upon those it regulates, but seems to ignore deadlines set for itself or by Congress. I think this just comes with the bureau

the FAA enforces strict deadlines upon those it regulates, but seems to ignore deadlines set for itself or by Congress. I think this just comes with the bureaucratic territory. My wife works in healthcare finance, especially with CMS on Medicare reimbursement. Having watched her doing this for a couple decades now, I can tell you that if you miss a CMS deadline by a day, they'll come down on you like a ton of bricks. But the deadlines set for their own operations are purely aspirational. They seem to kinda maybe try to come near those dates, but they're almost universally slipped. Adding insult to injury, when CMS misses a date to publish new regulations or whatever, that doesn't necessarily mean that my wife gets a corresponding number of days to submit her responses: she's often got to absorb it on her side, working faster because the government works slower.

Teever 5y ago
I wish there was some sort of federal law that mandated reciprocal deadline leniency in this kind of situation. Imagine a scenario where a government department was held to the same standard that they hold others to. Imagine that.
- vkou 5y ago
  This sounds like a good idea, could we extend it to the employee/employer relationship as well? Where your bosses gets held to the same standards they hold you? If you think that's legally or practically unworkable, well, there's your answer.
- ARandomerDude 5y ago
  Sadly, Washington is the largest special interest group in Washington.
- fallingknife 5y ago
  Or, if a deadline is blown, the agency has to either approve the permit, or ask a judge for an extension based on actual need.
bmitc 5y ago
Agreed on bureaucracy. Bureaucracy and the imbalance of power is rampant in the U.S., and it concerns me. I don't know if people ever did, but it really feels like nobody gives a shit about their customers or citizens, as far as companies and the U.S. government, respectively, are concerned. Last year, through a fluke since I ended up being away from my apartment for several months, I found out my gas company had incorrectly installed the gas meters in my apartment. Thus, I had been paying the upstairs neighbors' gas bill (and vice versa) for over five years. It took 7-9 months to get the thousands of dollars they owed me. And that was after basically calling them every two weeks, going through no-shows of their technicians, and arguing with them that they needed to go back the entire time I had overpaid. They wanted to only go back two or three years because that's only how much data they kept. Which fuck that, because after arguing about it, they were somehow magically able to go back the full duration of my account with them, "finding" the data. We literally hunted for a house and bought one in the in-between time of discovering the issue and getting my money. Can you imagine being able to tell some company you owe money to "I'll get it to you when I get to it, I'm really busy right now" or that "well, my records only go back so far, so I can't do anything about money I owe you before a certain time"? You'd be submitted to a credit agency and completely wrecked. In this and more of these scenarios, it is absolutely the most remote possibility that you can act like this towards companies and the government when they want something from you. It really bothers me to my core that we have no power against companies or government. This is what it's like to live in an oligarchy.
- MisterMower 5y ago
  The common denominator here is lack of competition. Utilities are regulated monopolies. No competition means no incentive to improve or provide better services at lower cost.
- daniel-cussen 5y ago
  Well...maybe. I will say USG is super on top of their shit when it comes to passports overseas. Total adhesion to protocol, and well thought out protocol at that, I have to recognize that in the face of your accusation of incompetence. You could be right too, not saying you're not. But I feel obliged to vindicate them.

Teever 5y ago

I wish there was some sort of federal law that mandated reciprocal deadline leniency in this kind of situation. Imagine a scenario where a government department was held to the same standard that they hold others to. Imagine that.

vkou 5y ago
This sounds like a good idea, could we extend it to the employee/employer relationship as well? Where your bosses gets held to the same standards they hold you? If you think that's legally or practically unworkable, well, there's your answer.
ARandomerDude 5y ago
Sadly, Washington is the largest special interest group in Washington.
fallingknife 5y ago
Or, if a deadline is blown, the agency has to either approve the permit, or ask a judge for an extension based on actual need.

bmitc 5y ago

Agreed on bureaucracy. Bureaucracy and the imbalance of power is rampant in the U.S., and it concerns me. I don't know if people ever did, but it really feels like nobody gives a shit about their customers or citizens, as far as companies and the U.S. government, respectively, are concerned. Last year, through a fluke since I ended up being away from my apartment for several months, I found out my gas company had incorrectly installed the gas meters in my apartment. Thus, I had been paying the upstairs neighbors' gas bill (and vice versa) for over five years. It took 7-9 months to get the thousands of dollars they owed me. And that was after basically calling them every two weeks, going through no-shows of their technicians, and arguing with them that they needed to go back the entire time I had overpaid. They wanted to only go back two or three years because that's only how much data they kept. Which fuck that, because after arguing about it, they were somehow magically able to go back the full duration of my account with them, "finding" the data. We literally hunted for a house and bought one in the in-between time of discovering the issue and getting my money. Can you imagine being able to tell some company you owe money to "I'll get it to you when I get to it, I'm really busy right now" or that "well, my records only go back so far, so I can't do anything about money I owe you before a certain time"? You'd be submitted to a credit agency and completely wrecked. In this and more of these scenarios, it is absolutely the most remote possibility that you can act like this towards companies and the government when they want something from you. It really bothers me to my core that we have no power against companies or government. This is what it's like to live in an oligarchy.

MisterMower 5y ago
The common denominator here is lack of competition. Utilities are regulated monopolies. No competition means no incentive to improve or provide better services at lower cost.
daniel-cussen 5y ago
Well...maybe. I will say USG is super on top of their shit when it comes to passports overseas. Total adhesion to protocol, and well thought out protocol at that, I have to recognize that in the face of your accusation of incompetence. You could be right too, not saying you're not. But I feel obliged to vindicate them.