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July 02, 2012 at 09:49 AM
Dozens of federal programs are trying to help people with federal programs find jobs, but only a few do much to measure what kind of a job they’re doing.
Officials at the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) have published that finding in a report prepared for Congress in compliance with the Government Performance and Results Act Modernization Act of 2010 (GPRAMA).
To me it seems as if this report illustrates an important point about the federal government: If we could get past the idea that just about all government programs are inherently evil and ought to be stopped before they plug us into giant battery chargers, or that all government programs are wonderful and ought to be protected from those wicked, greedy corporate executive, maybe we could come together and identify a bunch of programs that are legal, moral and reasonably ethical, by most folks’ standards, but just aren’t working that well and could use some fixing or eliminating.
There are some people who would say that people with disabilities have no right to support other than, perhaps, court protection of their property rights, a share of freely given charitable donations and copies of Atlas Shrugged. In the real world, I think most human societies have made a haphazard effort to provide community-funded help for people with serious disabilities.
Of course, the best way to help people is to help them find jobs, so they don’t need charity.
The GAO says federal government has at least 45 programs that help people with disabilities find jobs.
Some of the programs serve people with disabilities along with members of the general population, such as students and military veterans. Others focus on serving people with disabilities.
About 32 of the programs try to track at least one employment-related outcome — but 13 don’t track outcomes — and the only program that actually had a study demonstrating its impact on the clients was the Job Corps, the GAO officials said.
