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The Tax and Spend Spectator
Snazzy Sequestered Screeners
Our friends at TSA are going on a shopping spree.
(Page 2 of 2)
I checked Wrangler’s website and I can’t see how the government’s cost could total $1,000 per employee, especially on a $50 million order with truckload deliveries.
Buying just one item at a time on the website, not 50,000, Wrangler Hero cargo pants are $19.50, a Hero jacket is $19.99, Hero shirts are 10.99. Add the socks, one belt, one sweater and two ties to the price of the six shirts and the two pairs of trousers and I get a total bill of $186.00 per screener for the whole deal, $814.00 less than the $1,000.00 the taxpayers are paying.
The new uniforms will be “manufactured in the U.S. and Mexico,” says the TSA, even though the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 specifically requires the TSA to purchase uniforms made in the United States. The federal bureaucrats got around the Made-in-America manufacturing requirement by saying Mexico couldn’t be excluded as a manufacturer because of the North American Free Trade Agreement.
“Please don’t yell at the customs officers or the TSA officers,” said Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, warning of the inevitability of long lines at the airports. “They aren’t responsible for sequester.” Plus, at $1,000 a pop, they’re looking real snazzy.
About the Author
Ralph R. Reiland is the B. Kenneth Simon professor of free enterprise and an associate professor of economics at Robert Morris University in Pittsburgh.
Letter to the Editor View all comments (13) | Leave a comment
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Pecos Pete| 3.8.13 @ 7:17AM
Typical waste by Fecal Govt. I am surprised that the color of uniforms wasn't brown; but then I remembered King O's bumper stickers are about the same color of blue. And OFA's logo blue is pretty close to the uniform color. The OFA's web site base color is blue. Nothing wrong with the color blue. Just that King O and his czars make me blue.
notfooled| 3.8.13 @ 10:01AM
Blueshirts=Brownshirts?
My guess is they do.
The Bum likes blue, Hitler preferred brown.
Moe Blotz| 3.8.13 @ 9:34AM
Every article I have read here on American Spectator has referred to the recent sequestration as spending cuts. The real designation is a reduction in the rate of spending growth and our elite rulers will get to spend billions more than they did last year. Please stop referring to spending cuts since that has not happened.
BShep| 3.8.13 @ 9:53AM
2012 budget $100.00.
2013 budget $108.00.
2013 budget after sequestration $105.50.
Oh, the humanity. The cuts are going to kill people and starve children. Planes will fall from the sky. Dogs and cats will sleep together.
Wait, you mean the amount spent will still go UP? Where are the cuts????
You gotta splain it to the LIVs.
BShep| 3.8.13 @ 9:56AM
You should also mention the three full time calligraphers on the WH payroll. Their salaries cost the taxpayers $277, 000 per year.
The president gets hand written invitations to send to his peeps. We get planes falling from the sky.
PolishKnight| 3.8.13 @ 10:26AM
Here in NoVA, the government office workers are in a panic and claiming the sky is falling. It's a joke of course since if spending is not truly being cut, why are they panicked?
The answer appears to be that they buy into their own BS. When I hear a leftist's disingenuous arguments, I could at least respect them for being effective debaters. But when they believe their own myths, that makes them pathetic and not in a good way.
Ronsch| 3.8.13 @ 12:51PM
To quote from "Independence Day"..."You don't actually think they spend $20,000 on a hammer, $30,000 on a toilet seat, do you?"
JimH| 3.8.13 @ 1:01PM
What, no jackboots?
Occam's Tool| 3.8.13 @ 6:44PM
Ralph: The clothes will actually cost $50.00 to manufacture. The company will charge the government $1000.00 per, partially due to the 5000 pages of regulations each item will have to meet.
Brubaker| 3.8.13 @ 7:32PM
$1,000 per person for work clothes? Someone is getting a sizable kickback. Janet, how's it going?
Alan| 3.9.13 @ 10:27AM
Nothings too good for the Federal Govt.'s preatorian guard.
Stan Redmond| 3.10.13 @ 1:42PM
We can't have the most hated of all Americans in unsnazzy uniforms. The TSA welcomes the world to America. The TSA fondles all travelling America. The TSA will soon randomly inspect all Americans. The TSA employs otherwise unemployable Americans.
They gotta look good.
By the way who the hell would want to work for the TSA anyway? Do they not realize they really are the most hated of all people? My stomach aches when I walk in to an airport and I see those rediculous "officers" in their gestapo blue uniforms. Regardless of how courteous the food servers or airline staff may be the TSA is there to absolutely ruin any pleasantness (not that their is much) of flying.
homme nike air max BW | 3.11.13 @ 5:23AM
from falling as they chase jihadists www.shoxinfr.com/nike-free-50-c-40.html around the airports, the employee-supplied shoes are federally mandated to be “black leather with non-slip soles.”