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US Government Data Center Consolidation Behind Schedule, Cost Savings Uncertain

Posted by Unknown on from the metrics-are-hard dept.

itwbennett writes "The goal of saving $3 billion by closing 1253 data centers is 'very realistic,' says David Powner, director of IT management issues at the U.S. Government Accountability Office — except that agencies haven't been able to track cost savings for the initiative. Eighteen months from the 2015 deadline, 'we have no idea how much we've saved the taxpayers,' said Steve O'Keeffe, founder of MeriTalk, an online community for government IT issues. This isn't the first snag in the project. Almost a year ago, Slashdot reported that the project was woefully behind schedule." The government released a summary of what data they do have (PDF), and at least the DoD expects to save $575 million next fiscal year. Also see the full GAO report.

57 of 95 comments (clear)

  1. !able, unwilling by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    I'm guessing that they'd be able to track those metrics very well if they tried. My experience with the PHB management types is that they don't want to do anything unless they absolutely have to, especially if that something would create accountability for them or anyone on their teams.

    1. Re:!able, unwilling by alen · · Score: 2

      i worked for an DoD agency 13 years ago for a year. We had a main NT domain with a child domain for each of the 6 regional offices

      the admin in one of the offices refused to set up a trust between his domain and the main domain. for some reason no one could make him do it. i bet same here. some of the admins in the smaller offices are refusing to go along with this

    2. Re:!able, unwilling by timeOday · · Score: 2

      Sure, any organization has internal conflicts of interest when somebody is tasked to train their own replacement etc. That half billion in savings is mainly going to be salaries after all.

    3. Re:!able, unwilling by NecroPuppy · · Score: 3, Informative

      I'm (sorta) one of those admins.

      It's not that local sites are refusing to go along with the data center consolidation, as we have to justify anything that stays here instead of moving to the data center 400 miles away, it's that in a lot of cases the data center people are saying, "You have to move", and then not understanding the reasons why we can't.

      Whether or not this lack of understanding is deliberate or not, I'm not sure. We lowered our explanation to about a 6th grade comprehension level, and they finally seemed to get it, at least while they were on site.

      Stuff like:

      "These are the daily and weekly tasks we must perform with this system - you will have to sign an MOU/MOA (Memorandum of Understanding/Agreement) where you will accomplish these tasks how we tell you to." (Often, they didn't have the trained personnel to do it.)

      "You will have to provide 24/7/365 uptime, with at least three 9s reliability (yes, I know that's low, but we couldn't justify higher), including the ability to do file level restoration." (They really balked at the file level restoration.)

      "You have to have trained support personnel with OS experience." Their response was, "We can upgrade that to ." Our rebuttal, "No you can't, it has to stay in that exact configuration until changes are tested and approved by Echelon II."

      We got to keep most of our stuff, at least so far.

      --
      I like you, Stuart. You're not like everyone else, here, at Slashdot.
    4. Re:!able, unwilling by aaarrrgggh · · Score: 1

      The problem is proving that the total actual savings are in alignment, requiring cooperation between a number of different departments. If the program is optimized to maximize ROI (which they never are), you target avoided capital expenditures first by consolidating into sites with available capacity, and onto existing systems with available processing/storage from sites that require major infrastructure upgrades. One trigger is often battery replacement, and you use the opportunity to move towards a better solution.

      Later rounds try to further improve by avoiding the CapEx of replacement equipment at multiple sites.

  2. If you have to ask.... by TWiTfan · · Score: 1

    The answer is probably "0"

    --
    The cow says "Moo." The dog says "Woof." The Timothy says "Thanks, valued customer. We appreciate your input."
  3. It's in the name by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    Powner, Director of IT? Can't make that up.

  4. surprise surprise by ganjadude · · Score: 2, Funny

    Ever notice how easy it is to spend other peoples money? they have no real reason to try and save that 3 billion because its not from their pockets. just raise taxes again and it will all be ok. In the end this will probably be like everything else

    "we know we told you this project would save you 3 billion but we made an error"

    what was the error?

    "well we meant to say cost, not save. this change will cost you 3 billion"

    --
    have you seen my sig? there are many others like it but none that are the same
    1. Re:surprise surprise by gl4ss · · Score: 2

      Ever notice how easy it is to spend other peoples money? they have no real reason to try and save that 3 billion because its not from their pockets. just raise taxes again and it will all be ok. In the end this will probably be like everything else
          "we know we told you this project would save you 3 billion but we made an error"
          what was the error?
        "well we meant to say cost, not save. this change will cost you 3 billion"

      savings would mean that some people would be making themselves redundant. so what to do? fire half the people in the projects randomly in advance. sounds stupid, but works.

      --
      world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
    2. Re:surprise surprise by i+kan+reed · · Score: 1, Insightful

      I swear someone is going out of their way to down mod my posts recently. how is this troll??

      If I had to guess:
      Because it dramatically simplifies a situation, represents a sarcastically presented political position rather than a cogent point, and fails to delivery an adequate punchline for its overly politicized setup.

    3. Re:surprise surprise by geoffrobinson · · Score: 2

      It's just basic economics. When you aren't spending your own money, you aren't incentivized to control costs.

      --
      Except for ending slavery, the Nazis, communism, & securing American independence, war has never solved anything.
    4. Re:surprise surprise by Dishevel · · Score: 1

      So. If we take your explanation at face value.
      The GP was not a troll.
      So the problem here is that you do not know what a troll is. Let me help.

      An Internet Troll

      --
      Why is it so hard to only have politicians for a few years, then have them go away?
    5. Re:surprise surprise by i+kan+reed · · Score: 1

      Eh, inflammatory matches what I said to a reasonable degree. Sure, it matches slashdot's definition of flamebait better, but that mod is basically the forgotten step-child of the slashdot moderating world. Overrated gets more play.

      Also the bizarre meta-modding through modding my post is weird. I was honestly just trying to inform the GP of what aspects he could address if he wanted the mods to be less severe in the future. Answering a query about the motives of others isn't substantiating them.

    6. Re:surprise surprise by geoffrobinson · · Score: 1

      I didn't say every single person will try to spend as much as possible when they don't have to pay the bill. I said they aren't incentivized to control spending. That's true.

      --
      Except for ending slavery, the Nazis, communism, & securing American independence, war has never solved anything.
    7. Re:surprise surprise by s.petry · · Score: 1

      Bullshit, and a big-ole steaming pile of it. Many times /. moderation is not about really marking people as Trolls or Flame baiting. It's about people that don't like your opinion so mod you something to make you invisible, reduce your karma, and make you stop posting. The persons post was not flame bait by anyone's definition, nor was it a troll.

      --

      -The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.

  5. Whatever the government does, it does poorly... by mi · · Score: 3, Insightful

    If, as even the Democrats admit, the government is "too vast" for the President to be responsible, we ought to be shrinking it, rather than continue its expansion to the new domains (like, uh, healthcare)...

    --
    In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
    1. Re:Whatever the government does, it does poorly... by i+kan+reed · · Score: 1

      You know, I'm thankful for all those long-running political debates that were easily settled with a single sentence of hyperbole, like ...
      um...
      I'm sure it's happened lots.

    2. Re:Whatever the government does, it does poorly... by ebno-10db · · Score: 1, Insightful

      we ought to be shrinking [the government], rather than continue its expansion to the new domains (like, uh, healthcare)...

      Right, because it's impossible for government to handle health insurance well. Ignore Canada, Europe, Japan, Australia and virtually every other developed country in the world whose governments handle than it better than our system, because they must be outliers, and it defies your version of "common sense" (which trumps real world data) and uh, oh yeah, you're ideologically indisposed to face reality. While you're at it, ignore our own limited socialized health insurance (aka Medicare) because it, uh, has problems! Yeah, that's it, it isn't perfect! Never mind that it's cheaper, more effective and has a lower inflation rate than the mess of a system for people under 65.

      The problem with Obamacare isn't that it involves government, but that it doesn't involve government enough. Obama and the Dems, in the great "third way" tradition, didn't go for a simple and efficient universal public health insurer (ok, that approach has destroyed what was once our Northern neighbor) or even allow a public option. Instead it involves the always efficient "private sector" to guarantee profits and bloated salaries for worthless middle men.

    3. Re:Whatever the government does, it does poorly... by Nadaka · · Score: 1

      As a non-canadian, you didn't qualify for coverage of your healthcare in Canada. Funny how that works when people from south of the border come north looking for jobs.

    4. Re:Whatever the government does, it does poorly... by mi · · Score: 3, Informative

      Failure to deal with the nation ending enormous failure of the "free market" solution to a social issue of health care

      Sadly, the healthcare market in the US has not been free since the 1940-ies. During the War the government sought to limit workers' salaries, so, to attract talent, employers started offering "benefits" — like health insurance. This separated payers for health-care from the consumers of it — triggering the spiraling costs as the patients demanded the very best, while blaming the insurers for attempts to keep the costs sensible. The government compounded the problem making such benefits tax-deductible for employers, without counting them as taxable income for the employees.

      Actually freeing the market would've helped — but, for some reason, the "reformers" were dead set against the competition (without which the market can not be considered free). Even buying a health plan from a different State is illegal, certainly not from a foreign insurer. One can even be forgiven for thinking, the sabotage of the market was deliberate — so as to allow to claim "market failure" and finally give the politicians the power they all tend to crave after 2 or 3 terms in office (some even sooner).

      Instead of freeing, the market got under an even harder government control. Yes, control of that same benevolent omniscient government, that can not consolidate freaking datacenters... But don't worry, they will know, how to best allocate your monies (that you paid in taxes through your life) to your healthcare — that you will need primarily after retiring...

      Oh, and the actual government agency ensuring compliance will be the same one, that already picks targets for audits and scrutiny based on the taxpayers' political persuasion. Are you honestly claiming, healthcare will improve in such circumstances? Will you really be surprised to learn, 30 years from now, that Conservatives are having their life-support turned-off, say, 30% sooner, than Progressives because the local "Independent Payment Advisory Board" (a.k.a. "death panel") decided against their case?

      --
      In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
    5. Re:Whatever the government does, it does poorly... by ebno-10db · · Score: 1

      Forget all those statistics and other fancy nancy stuff - the PP has an anecdote! Case closed.

    6. Re:Whatever the government does, it does poorly... by deKernel · · Score: 1

      Then by all means, please move to where you believe the health care system is better. Nobody is saying you have to stay here and ruin the current system.

    7. Re:Whatever the government does, it does poorly... by Dishevel · · Score: 1, Insightful

      And it isn't like we don't have thousands of examples of the gov't successful management either.

      Um. Ok. So list 50.

      --
      Why is it so hard to only have politicians for a few years, then have them go away?
    8. Re:Whatever the government does, it does poorly... by mi · · Score: 2

      Right, because it's impossible for government to handle health insurance well.

      "Fallacy of excluded middle". I did not say it is "impossible". It is possible — and is, indeed, done in all the places you list. But it is done poorly in all of those places.

      Instead it involves the always efficient "private sector"

      Free market is the most efficient thing humanity has come up with. Our problem was that this particular market was not at all free — not for decades... Instead of freeing it, Obamacare made it even worse...

      --
      In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
    9. Re:Whatever the government does, it does poorly... by Dishevel · · Score: 1

      Imagine the death rate of members of the party not in control of the IPAB just before a big election.

      --
      Why is it so hard to only have politicians for a few years, then have them go away?
    10. Re:Whatever the government does, it does poorly... by lightknight · · Score: 1

      Yes and no. See, I am very interested in what will happen if / when socialized medicine manages to make its full debut in the US.

      Why, you ask? Well, there has been a long-standing argument about whether or not the US medical patient has been subsidizing the developmental costs of those drugs...and whether the rest of the world's citizenry has gotten to ride for free as a result. On one hand, you have the pharms, who have political lobbyists, IP trickery, loads of scams, but occasionally some novel drugs coming out; on the other hand, you have host governments claiming that pharms are overcharging for new drugs, benefiting from basic research on the public's dime, etc.

      If socialized medicine takes place in the US, and new drug research drops off a cliff, then we have a fair idea that the US medical patient was, in fact, subsidizing the rest of the world, and that, the prices charged by the pharms were possibly, on some level, aside from whatever inefficiencies and graft taking place, necessary (for lack of a better word). Up until now, we've only heard that the pharms have been raping us, and that socialized medicine will save the day; perhaps it's because I'm a programmer, but I am curious as to those odd end cases or exceptions where that might not be true. The above scenario, of course, comes with many caveats, so getting a simple yes or no, in the even that the US actually does run that way, may take a fair amount of analysis.

      --
      I am John Hurt.
    11. Re:Whatever the government does, it does poorly... by Nadaka · · Score: 1

      Only the failures make the news. Things going normally are not news worthy.

    12. Re:Whatever the government does, it does poorly... by jfengel · · Score: 1

      Obama and the Democrats did what was politically possible. The public option would have been too politically unpalatable for the most conservative Democrats. Under the rules, they needed every single Democrat; no Republican would have given serious consideration to any plan, even the one that is actually substantially similar to their own (and could have been even more similar if they'd participated in the development of it).

      In hindsight, they might as well have gone for a public option: most of the conservative Democrats who put the kibosh on it to protect their right flanks lost anyway in the resulting outrage (a bizarre combination of complaints about the cost with complaints about nonexistent "death panels" whose actual purpose was to reduce costs). If they'd plotted it out better, they'd have just expanded Medicare as an insurance provider, which would have been far neater and cleaner than the state-run exchanges that are supposed to do the job. (People like to praise state governments over federal ones, largely because people are so focused on what they imagine is The Big Picture that they have no idea how badly their state governments mismanage things, and how little scrutiny they get for it, while suffering from massive losses to scale than the federal government achieves.)

    13. Re:Whatever the government does, it does poorly... by mi · · Score: 2

      Only the failures make the news. Things going normally are not news worthy.

      Well, that did not prevent you from claiming, there are "thousands" of successes... But then you get called on it and can not name even a handful... Maybe, there really aren't (that m)any?

      --
      In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
    14. Re:Whatever the government does, it does poorly... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

      When you use a term like 'death panel' you are showing that you have not separated emotion from logic. It's a word used solely to activate an emotional response. It's completely meaningless as any healthcare whether private or public will make a cost/benefit analysis. Do you call every decision that a private health insurer makes a 'death panel'? You may make some decent points but as long as you are allowing your emotion to fill in those little gaps in knowledge that everyone has you will not see the entire problem.

      If you compare countries with and without socialized healthcare the lifespan and living conditions of people are dramatically different. What was the lifespan in 1930? What exactly are you comparing to the last 70 years too? What cross country comparisons have you made? What other variables and factors have you taken into consideration? Have you really thought about this or did you have a position and then find things that fit your view? Any honest consideration of socialized healthcare would find both positive and negative issues. If you only find negative ones (or positive ones for that matter) then you view is distorted and your opinion questionable.

      Here's a hint for everybody. All large organizations have similar positives (economies of scale and explicit processes) and negatives (slow to change and overhead). It doesn't really matter whether you call that large organization a company, a government or a church.

    15. Re:Whatever the government does, it does poorly... by moeinvt · · Score: 1

      We should shrink the FEDERAL government. It's up to people to decide what sort of government (if any) that they want, but even if you believe in a huge role for government it should be created in a "bottom up" fashion. Perform as many services as possible at the local or country level, do some at the state level and only as an absolute last resort, give the central government power.

      This country is F*&^%$ up because we have a bunch of A$$#0!z in Washington D.C. trying to micro-manage the lives of 330 million people in a very large and diverse country. It's not working for the benefit of the people.

    16. Re:Whatever the government does, it does poorly... by ebno-10db · · Score: 1

      Then by all means, please move to where you believe the health care system is better.

      Let me translate:

      America, love it or leave it

      Very retro. I think I just saw Richard Nixon and Abbie Hoffman strolling by.

      Of course that attitude is a great American tradition. It's entirely reasonable to say that I should leave the country where I was born, have lived my whole life, and am a citizen of by virtue of the Fourteenth Amendment, because I think it's desirable to change some particular aspect. Many famous Americans have avoided discord by offering and following that advice, from George Washington to Susan B. Anthony to Martin Luther King.

      P.S. If you ever come with an argument instead of a silly shopworn slogan, let me know.

    17. Re:Whatever the government does, it does poorly... by moeinvt · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Medicare is "cheaper"? Yeah, because government fixes the prices they pay. Nothing is "free". Government stiffs the hospital by price fixing Medicaid/Medicare services, so hospitals just shift that cost onto everyone else, especially the uninsured.
      Government forces hospitals to treat people at emergency rooms regardless of their willingness or ability to pay, but does not fund this mandate, so that also translates into higher bills for everyone else. Government bans re-importation of prescription drugs & medical devices, thus forcing Americans to subsidize R&D for the rest of the world and guarantee profits for big pharma.

      With all of this cost shifting, retail prices are insanely expensive, so people are compelled to buy insurance. There's how your worthless middle man enters the picture, and now you MUST buy his product or the IRS will be after you.

      Government has been heavily involved in the healthcare system for 50 years. What's the result? Costs have exploded, millions are unable to afford basic services, quality of service is poor for the price paid, etc. etc. Yet people think that even more government is the "solution"? That's how Einstein defined "insanity".

      Eliminating a middle man would reduce costs. Competition and innovation would also drive down costs and increase quality. Government price controls and mandates do exactly the opposite.

    18. Re:Whatever the government does, it does poorly... by moeinvt · · Score: 2

      "we're going to drag you kicking and screaming in to the future"

      "you're too stupid to do so yourself."

      You arbitrarily assert your intellectual superiority and thus decide that you're going to steal my wealth and coerce my behavior under threat of violence? For my own good?

      "We're liberals."

      Oh really? Never would have guessed.

    19. Re:Whatever the government does, it does poorly... by moeinvt · · Score: 2

      "...enormous failure of the "free market" solution to a social issue of health care"

      It never ceases to amaze me that we can have a situation where the big government "solution" has been an utter and complete catastrophe, but the government worshipers INSIST that the evil "free market" is the problem.

      Government implemented Medicare. They implemented Medicaid. They ordered hospitals to treat everyone at the ER regardless of whether or not they could pay. They mandate what services insurance policies must cover. They encourage and facilitate cartel behavior in both healthcare and insurance. They ban competition in the drug and medical device markets.

      Obviously this system sucks, and it's a direct result of the fact that government destroyed the free market through price fixing, cost shifting, unfunded mandates and stupid regulations.

      The only sectors of the economy that even compare to the healthcare disaster are housing and higher education, which the government has also ruined with their stupid policies.

    20. Re:Whatever the government does, it does poorly... by moeinvt · · Score: 2

      A healthcare system where the user pays no marginal cost for services will create nearly infinite demand for services. Government cannot possibly pay for this. Therefore, services must be rationed and limited to constrain costs. Yes, "death panel" is emotional rhetoric, but it has an element of accuracy. In a government-run healthcare system, bureaucrats will inevitably be making life and death decisions.

      The benefits of socialized medicine are that everyone has access to services at no marginal cost, the role of the middle man is very limited and billing procedures are simplified.

      The negatives are too numerous to list in this comment, but it's essentially the same as every other socialistic scheme. Everyone is equal and equally miserable.

      The free market is the solution for providing the most services to the most people at the lowest cost and with the highest quality. The free market WORKS when government doesn't wreck it. The drawback is that some people will not be able to afford services. That's where WE, as individuals or as part of charitable organizations (not the F&*%ing government) have a moral responsibility.

    21. Re:Whatever the government does, it does poorly... by tnk1 · · Score: 1

      I've been interested in that question myself. The reality will likely be somewhere in-between. The pharmaceutical companies probably will find some way to cope, quite probably with government aid. How that aid adds to the behind the scenes costs of socialized medicine would be another question.

      Certainly, someone is either not telling the whole truth, or at least, has a serious misperception. The ability of other governments to negotiate lower prices may actually represent the fact that actually "producing" a drug is not all that expensive once it has been discovered and tested. So, when the foreign governments use their collective bargaining power to get lower costs, the producers can probably tread water by simply taking a markup on the production costs, as opposed to adding in the development costs. In that case, the US consumer would likely be the only group supporting actual forward progress on drugs, and your worst-case scenario could come about.

      However, if the pharmaceutical companies are simply charging the US consumer what they can get, and calling it "research costs", that's different. Although I know there are liars and cheats out there in the business world, I rarely assume they are outright lying about something like this. That does not mean that they are telling the complete truth, for whatever reason.

      There is also the possibility that the swamplike morass of US regulation could cause the costs to be higher. In that event, it is anyone's guess whether socializing medicine would make that better or worse.

      It is not easy to argue against a health care program that isn't going to overcharge me and abandon me or my family when they need it the most. On the surface, it is like fighting against my own self-interest. The problem is, if everyone only thinks of their own self-interest, it may be that no one's interests get served.

      History reminds me that the population of the City of Rome used to be maintained by a free grain distribution by the state. When it was time for Octavian to assemble the powers he used to assure his power as Rome's first emperor, he made sure that the source of the grain (Egypt), was made his personal domain. By controlling the welfare of the people of Rome, he ensured his power in a very realistic way, even while pretending to simply be "first among equals". Handing centralized control of our welfare to the government hands whoever is control of that government significant power. As much as I'd like a health care system that isn't going to shaft me, I am aware that the only way you can avoid trusting the wrong person is by making sure you don't have to trust any one person with all the power in the first place.

    22. Re:Whatever the government does, it does poorly... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Except that local governments tend to be corrupt, and get more corrupt the more 'local' they get. It's easy for money to buy a county or a state, harder to buy all the states. "Local" also has the problem of creating stratification. Poor areas will get poor service because there is little money available for services, and those areas are likely to get more poor as a result. Those poor areas drag down the rest of the country because the country is an open system Unless you fence them in, violate their human rights, etc- Sounds a lot like a dystopian scifi story, doesn't it?. Living a class based world where the haves rule the have nots is, frankly, bad. History teaches us this.

    23. Re:Whatever the government does, it does poorly... by moeinvt · · Score: 2

      Didn't your parents explain to you that violence is only justified in response to aggression? I thought liberals were peaceful people? What justification do you have for imposing your beliefs on others with threats of violence? Having delusions about the superiority of your intelligence doesn't qualify.

    24. Re:Whatever the government does, it does poorly... by tnk1 · · Score: 1

      We should cut all of them. The problem is that no one in power wants to cut any of them.

      That is why you resist giving those same people more stuff that they will have to manage in the future, because even if they had the courage to do it, their own constituents won't let them make meaningful reform when the time comes. The only "reform" they will accept are unfunded mandates (which leaves the costs on the private entities to pass on), or more services to band-aid the ones we have now.

      The one thing people miss is that there is no great human "right" to health care. For the two million years or so before humanity had social insurance, there was nothing at all the government provided except in very specific intervals, and mostly to maintain public order (ie. bread and circuses). While misery certainly existed, like it still does today, for the most part, people found other solutions to those issues.

      Health care, by it's nature is a gigantic black hole that you throw money into. The longer people live due to your system, the more they need your system. It's a cost that not only increases with every eligible member, but it's very successes can make it more expensive. That means that health care is always a losing battle unless you define some sort of realistic scenario for wrapping up or limiting benefits. What happens when you try and do that today? On the Right they talk about "death panels", and on the Left, there's always some dread disease that affects some minority that absolutely must be cured no matter what, even if you could overcome the disease though changing your lifestyle.

      The government does not have to solve all our problems for us. It may not be an evil proto-totalitarian communist state, but that doesn't mean that it is a good idea to hand over all our problems to it.

    25. Re:Whatever the government does, it does poorly... by ebno-10db · · Score: 1

      Obama and the Democrats did what was politically possible.

      No. It'd be one thing if Obama had tried and failed, but he didn't even try. He's notorious for first compromising with himself then using that as a starting point for negotiations. Any kid knows that's not the way you bargain. Not that I think Obama doesn't know how to be persuasive. He learned politics in Chicago, where you're not twisting somebody's arm enough until you break it. Obama is very good at playing hardball, but only does it for things he actually cares about. The premature "compromises" and excuses about bipartisanship just mean that he never really wanted it in the first place.

    26. Re:Whatever the government does, it does poorly... by moeinvt · · Score: 1

      Point taken. I momentarily forgot that the discussion was being observed by third parties. I'll keep that in mind.

      I don't think a rational argument works with a person who has openly stated their intent to impose their will on you under the threat of violence which they claim is justified on the basis of their superior intelligence.

    27. Re:Whatever the government does, it does poorly... by moeinvt · · Score: 1

      If you have a contract with an insurance company which covers specified services, actuaries might determine the premiums, but I don't see how they would make life and death decisions. A service is covered, or it isn't.

      "can you point to an example where a free market has increased the life span in a country? "

      That could be the subject of a doctoral thesis. Lifespan is easily quantified, but if lifespan = f (x, y, z ... fm) how do you quantify 'fm'? Is the invention of antibiotics and vaccines market-driven? That could be a debate in and of itself.

      I don't claim free markets solve everything. I do believe that markets are the method by which we can maximize the total amount of services provided. In my ideal system, the local doctors and hospitals have to compete like all other retailers. I want to see a flier and coupons in the Sunday newspaper advertising weekly specials on EKGs or a 2-for-1 deal on routine physicals. Price transparency is desperately needed in healthcare so consumers can make choices.

      Government can help by making sure medical service providers obey the same anti-trust and anti-price discrimination laws that every other business must follow.

      I agree wholeheartedly with your solution of getting federal government OUT of the healthcare business and letting the states do their own thing. That's how the Canadian system started. A single province. I'd like nothing better than to observe what happens as various states try various approaches and I'll vote with my feet to find the system I like best.

  6. Save now vs. over time by Enry · · Score: 4, Insightful

    How much have they saved now? Probably not much, and probably spent more.

    It costs money to find the location, arrange the contracts, hire new people/lay off or move staff, and move equipment between rooms. Even then, many organizations may say it's cheaper to buy new hardware than it is to move 5+ year old servers.

    However, the efficiency once many of those data centers is closed will become apparent. Space/power/cooling/networking/staff isn't cheap. Consolidating will give you some amazing savings a few years in.

    1. Re:Save now vs. over time by Nadaka · · Score: 1

      Most likely they can't say how much they saved because the previous accounting of the cost of those numerous data centers was sporadic at best. You can't know how much you saved if you don't know how much it cost to run what you replaced.

    2. Re:Save now vs. over time by aaarrrgggh · · Score: 1

      ...until you find you have all this orphaned equipment that nobody actually knows what it does in 5 years.

  7. US Budget Deficit Shrinks Far Faster Than Expected by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Maybe we should slow down with the deficit reductions; this consolodation may not be necessary and may be detrimental.

    Since the recession ended four years ago, the federal budget deficit has topped $1 trillion every year. But now the government's annual deficit is shrinking far faster than anyone in Washington expected, and perhaps even faster than many economists think is advisable for the health of the economy.

    That is the thrust of a new report released Tuesday by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, estimating that the deficit for this fiscal year, which ends on Sept. 30, will fall to about $642 billion, or 4 percent of the nation's annual economic output, about $200 billion lower than the agency estimated just three months ago.

    The agency forecast that the deficit, which topped 10 percent of gross domestic product in 2009, could shrink to as little as 2.1 percent of gross domestic product by 2015 — a level that most analysts say would be easily sustainable over the long run — before beginning to climb gradually through the rest of the decade.

    "Revenues have been strong as the economy has outperformed a bit," said Joel Prakken, a founder of Macroeconomic Advisers, a forecasting firm based in St. Louis.

    Over all, the figures demonstrate how the economic recovery has begun to refill the government's coffers. At the same time, Washington, despite its political paralysis, has proved remarkably successful at slashing the deficit through a variety of tax increases and cuts in domestic and military programs.

  8. A Sign of the Times by VortexCortex · · Score: 4, Insightful

    You know you're in trouble when they speak of how much money they're saving instead of how much they spent to acquire a feature or benefit. What about the data center that stores every digital interaction in America? I bet that costs a pretty penny to operate, let's shut it down, it's not doing us any good. Didn't stop the Boston Bombing... Hell, zoning laws could have prevented the recent explosion in West, TX (which was more harmful than the Boston bombs), but I don't see them trying to save anything at all anywhere -- Not even lives.

    "Honey, look what I got, you wouldn't believe how much money I saved today!" -- No. She spent money, didn't "save" a dime. I'll evaluate cost to benefit ratio to determine if the purchases were wise.

    Want to save money? Why not get rid of the DHS? They're not needed. We have FBI and cops already. We don't need a huge cumbersome annoying workforce of security guards who don't actually provide security. You Can't Provide Security for others -- They can only protect themselves, and should be aware of surroundings and cautious of dangers if need be; That saves money and lives.

    How much of the money they're spending on 3rd party contractors is wasted by inflating the costs to turn a profit? I'm not stupid. They haven't saved a dime one.

  9. This isn't news. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Government program behind schedule and over budget exactly according to plan.

  10. some of us saw this coming by CAIMLAS · · Score: 1

    Some of us saw this coming since the day it was announced.

    a) This is big government we're talking about. We're lucky the costs aren't higher.
    b) Since when has anything orchestrated by this administration been anything but the opposite of what claimed?
    c) We're lucky they're actually telling us at this point.

    --
    ~/ssh slashdot.org ssh: connect to host slashdot.org port 22: too many beers
  11. To quote John Glenn by Lucas123 · · Score: 1

    "How do you think you'd feel if you knew you were on top of two million parts built by the lowest bidder in a government contract?"

  12. They need another datacenter by hawguy · · Score: 2

    They need another datacenter to hold the computers that track the cost savings from the other datacenters.

  13. Two things are certain. by 3seas · · Score: 2

    Hovernment does not know how to budget and Software is always behind schedule.
    Put the two toigether and you'll not have any savings at all but a growing cost.

  14. Been there before by ErichTheRed · · Score: 1

    Data center consolidations are never easy, and this is most likely being handled by a for-profit contractor, so tack on an extra 20% to whatever price tag it is, just for overhead.

    Think of all the stuff that has to happen:
    - All the connectivity to various networks has to be moved or duplicated. If we're not talking IPsec over the Internet, that means circuit orders, routing changes, etc. which quickly multiply and all involve tons of coordination.
    - If you're doing P2V, that has to be carefully scheduled and everything needs to be tested on the consolidation hardware before you decommission the old stuff completely.
    - If you're doing lift-and-move for things that can't or shouldn't be on VMs, downtime, network changes and logistics to get it to the new place need to be coordinated.
    - All the system dependencies need to be worked out. System X will break without connectivity to Systems S, T and Z. System T will fail intermittently if the latency between System F goes above a certain point, taking down A, B and N. Etc. Etc. Yay for integration.

    Also, DC migration plans tend to expose all the skeletons that previous admins left in the closet. Well-worn examples of undocumented networks, networks that unexpectedly rely on some crappy Linksys switch backboning traffic between key segments are par for the course. [1]

    My experience from the private sector with consolidations is usually large companies wanting to shovel things that started off in branches up to a central point, or to move IT someplace with a lower cost of living. In every case, it's never paid off right away. The fact that it's the federal government just means they have more real estate at their disposal, so it's a bigger job, not necessarily more or less cost.

    [1] My favorite comes from the dark ages of Token Ring where it turned out that the link between two components of a very important, must-be-running system depended on TR gateway software running on an original IBM PC AT with two TR NICs.- and this was in the 90s. It was never meant to be that way, but it turned out that someone never documented this and it was found during a move.

    1. Re:Been there before by BlueGMan · · Score: 1

      I work for a rather large agency... our initial numbers are coming back at 3X the cost to "consolidate".. So any savings for power, space, etc are trumped by those "for-profit" contractors running the data centers. At this point it almost looks like it was a plan to put money in someone's pocket, not save anything since the "big-boys" are getting all of the work.

      --
      "The world is moving so fast these days that the man who says it can't be done is generally interrupted by someone doing
  15. New data center... heh! by DarthVain · · Score: 1

    A few years ago, we got a "new" data center. I was all excited to move our old and busted applications at least off of old an busted hardware!

    However what we got was a new building.

    Rather than getting new servers, what we actually got was a few days of downtime while they unplugged and loaded it all on a truck and drove our busted hardware to the new building! Progress!

    When I was told, I had one of those laughs... Although all I could think of was what would happen if the semi truck carrying all our stuff crashed... sure it is all backed up, but man we would have been screwed.

  16. Inside the DoD by Gogo0 · · Score: 1

    I work for the DoD (Army) and have seen the datacenter consolidation progress in my organization and others in my Theatre. There is no method or order to collect energy savings analysis, so we are never going to know how much money/power is being saved. No one, at least in my Signal command or lower, ever asked for it.

    Of course, being that the consolidation is mostly-complete in my Theatre, its too late go gather any real data. Most likely, Brigades will simply make estimates based on the number of servers then and now.

    We also have nearly every user workstation hibernating after ten minutes of user inactivity as part of the three billion dollar energy-saving presidential order. No data has been collected on how effective that is either.

    Its all typical DoD kneejerk bullshit, no one knows the true impact, they just want to finish before their peer Commanders to look good for promotion.