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Privatization, Outsourcing and Insourcing Trends in Federal Government

Federal Government Privatization Chapter of Annual Privatization Report 2011

May 1, 2012

Adam Summers, Anthony Randazzo

This section of Reason Foundation's Annual Privatization Report 2011 provides an overview of the latest federal insourcing, housing finance, private spaceflight and other news on privatization and public-private partnerships in the federal government. Topics include:

• The ongoing dispute over what constitutes “inherently governmental” functions continued in 2011, and new Obama administration regulations could undermine federal outsourcing policy standards dating back to 1955.
• Regulators implementing the Dodd-Frank Act are creating significant risk for both mortgage investors and securitizers and appear likely to undercut the private mortgage industry while benefitting government mortgage providers. 
• In 2011, Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and the Federal Housing Administration (FHA) combined to purchase or guarantee 95 percent of all new mortgages in America with some mortgages worth as much as $729,750. Every one of these mortgages is backed by taxpayer money.
• Federal agencies, under the encouragement of President Obama, are expected to generate nearly $13 billion in cost savings from asset divestiture, $9.8 billion of which comes form the Department of Defense’s Base Realignment and Closure (BRAC) efforts.
• The federal government owns approximately 1.2 million properties that cost $20 billion a year to maintain. Recent Congressional efforts to pass a Civil Property Realignment Act could save as much as $15 billion, according to the Office of Management and Budget.

New at Reason: Review of Federal Privatization Issues in 2011 and Today

April 23, 2012, 11:59pm

Leonard Gilroy, Harris Kenny

The rollout of Reason Foundation’s Annual Privatization Report 2011 begins with the release of the Federal Government Privatization section, authored by Reason’s Adam Summers and Anthony Randazzo.

Branson Christens First-Ever Commercial Spaceport in New Mexico

October 18, 2011, 4:57pm

Harris Kenny

This week Virgin Group media mogul Sir Richard Branson christened the first-ever commercial spaceport in Sierra County, New Mexico. The 110,000-square-foot spaceport cost over $200 million to build (thanks in part to taxpayer-financed support.)

The Ultimate Bridge to Nowhere

Saying goodbye to the space program

July 12, 2011

Gene Healy

Friday marked the space shuttle's swan song, as the Atlantis lifted off from the Kennedy Space Center for the program's 135th and final flight. "We are retiring the shuttle in favor of nothing," Michael Griffin, President Bush's NASA administrator, told The Washington Post. Gene Healy has a different take. Here, as usual, Healy writes, doing “nothing” gets a bad rap. Maybe we should be “in favor of nothing” until the advocates of federally funded spaceflight can come up with an argument for it that doesn’t make us spray coffee out of our noses.

New at Reason: Review of Federal Privatization Issues in 2010 and Today

February 16, 2011, 3:04pm

Adam Summers

The rollout of Reason Foundation's Annual Privatization Report 2010 continues today with the release of the Federal Government Privatization section, authored by Reason's Adam Summers and Anthony Randazzo.

NASA to Offer Kennedy Space Center Facilities to Private Aerospace Companies

February 6, 2011, 11:58pm

Adam Summers

The space shuttle fleet is about to be retired and some are wondering what will become of the Kennedy Space Center, which is geared mostly to support the shuttle program. To fill the gap left by the retiring shuttle fleet, NASA is offering private aerospace companies the opportunity to use some of the Kennedy Space Center's facilities.

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