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[attach=left]1330[/attach]Not content to leave Tom Cruise alone in a self promotional Adwords Campaign, the American Government is buying Adwords units in defense of American Foreign Policy.
The ad (pictured left) reads “Peace & Security, Creating security through improved relations and cooperation” and links through to a page on America.gov with a motto of “Telling America’s Story.” The page includes stories on Syria and Nuclear Reactors, Terrorists and other Bush Administration foreign policy news.It’s not clear whether this ad is being displayed within the United States itself, or simply to the rest of the world. Tax payer money well spent, or waste of money propaganda via Adsense units? You can be the judge.
Looks like quite a bit of the traffic for America.gov is from outside the USA. I’d bet those ads are only for people outside of the US.
Pretty strange though.
They’re wasted in far worse ways (and I’m not talking about the military, just the government being inefficient in general).
David;229764 wrote:They’re wasted in far worse ways (and I’m not talking about the military, just the government being inefficient in general).But is it inefficiency of our government, or over-efficiency of our private industry workforce at the expense of the worker’s quality of life, health, and well-being? Probably a little of both.
My friend studied this stuff in undergrad and once made a claim that competition in this country is driving our human workforce well past the point of diminishing returns – where our workday is becoming so long and packed that by the end of the day, we’re barely contributing anything, and, more importantly, we’re exhausted. He claimed this is very different from many countries in Europe, for example.
Perhaps, the contrast of the government (which does not feel this competition as strongly) with this overworked workforce makes the government look inefficient.
… just a thought.
Rather than describing it as inefficiency, maybe it would be more accurate to say unnecessary bureaucracy. There are entire government agencies that have outlived their purpose, yet they continue to exist. Once you start a program, agency or whatever, it’s very difficult to end it. The net result is inefficiency, though it may not necessarily be the fault of the government employees or a lack of motivation.
I will agree that Americans as a whole tend to overwork, leaving nothing at the end of the day and a diminished quality of life. Combatting that requires a conscious, daily decision — and there are a lot of people working “unconsciously.”
@VvWolverinevV 229847 wrote:
He claimed this is very different from many countries in Europe, for example.
And look at their economies, look at what those counties do in terms of work. America may be overworked, but we are not past the point of diminishing returns.
Lets compare the top 10 French companies:
http://www.france.com/web_links/display.cfm?ID=31
to the top 10 (the rest of the Fortune 500) American companies:
USATODAY.com – List of the Fortune 500
Many, if not most of those American companies are globally successful giants, I haven’t even heard of most those French companies!
I, for one, would rather die young and know I made a difference on the rest of the world.
VvWolverinevV;229847 wrote:My friend studied this stuff in undergrad and once made a claim that competition in this country is driving our human workforce well past the point of diminishing returns – where our workday is becoming so long and packed that by the end of the day, we’re barely contributing anything, and, more importantly, we’re exhausted. He claimed this is very different from many countries in Europe, for example.I’d take exception to that “diminishing returns” remark. I think that statement depends on what kind of “return” you are measuring. If you’re looking at the per capita GNP, here’s the top 10 countries per the World Bank, as of 2006:
- Luxembourg
- Norway
- Switzerland
- Denmark
- Iceland
- Ireland
- United States
- Austria
- Belgium
- Japan
So the US does well, but there are some surprises. Where I think the US falls further behind is in other measures of “returns” such as quality of life. We work longer hours, have shorter vacations and few holidays than most european countries. I’m not saying they’ve got it right and we’ve got it wrong, but I think we’ve got to keep in mind that there is more to life than money. What about socializing with friends? The arts? Reading? Enjoying the outdoors? Yeah, you can do them all here in the States, but my perception is that we lag behind many of the countries in europe in those areas.
So ask your friend to clarify what he means by “barely contributing anything.” I’m curious to know the response.
I think you guys might be misunderstanding my use of diminishing returns…
Dictionary:
diminishing returns (dĭ-mĭn’ĭ-shĭng) pl.n.A yield rate that after a certain point fails to increase proportionately to additional outlays of capital or investments of time and labor.
So this does not necessarily mean that there is zero return on man hours spent, but rather the return is not proportional to additional hours. Of course it is in the interest of the employers for Americans to work as hard as they do, and the result is very competitive American industry.
… But my real point was that, although there are certainly some inefficiencies in our government, it may seem more inefficient from the perspective of someone working in competitive industry. I’m not sure it’s fair to ask our government to conform to the same competition at the expense of its employees’ quality of life – especially since the role of government is precisely to improve our quality of life.
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