The Angry Drunk Bureaucrat: A Bureaucrat's Aside

The Rules of Bureaucracy

Rule #O: "The Rules of Bureaucracy are mutable, non-canonical, non-ordinal, and contradictory, except in the cases where they are not."
Rule #1: "Document everything you do; if you didn't write it down, it didn't happen."
Rule #2 [The Sixty Minutes Rule]: "Never do anything that would cause Ed Bradley, Mike Wallace, Morley Safer, Steve Croft, Leslie Stahl, or even Andy Rooney to persue you down a hallway with a camera crew."
Rule #3: "Nothing Simple is Ever Easy"
Rule #4: "It's about the money; follow the money."
Rule #5: "Never ascribe to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity.
Rule #6: "Politics is the enemy of good government."
Rule #7: "The biggest detriment to public service is the public."
Rule #8: "The second biggest detriment to public service is the service."
Rule #9: "There's a reason; there's ALWAYS a reason."
Rule #10: "The Law is a harsh mistress: The rigorous and exacting application of which can benefit of society when used correctly to advance good policy and block bad, and be the bane of society when used incorrectly to advance bad policy and block good."
Rule #11: "Public service often involves waking up in the morning, opening up the newspaper, and discovering that someone, somewhere out there thinks that you're a dickhead."
Rule #12: "No one really knows what you do."
Rule #13 [Luke's Rule]: "No one ever acts like the bastard they really are."
Rule #14: "Bureaucracy endures."
Rule #15: "The longer you work in bureaucracy, the more Catch-22 resembles non-fiction."
Rule #16: "Politicians are not smarter than you."
Rule #18: "Money is not created equal."
Rule #19: "Mediocrity is normalcy."
Rule #17: "Within any bureaucratic structure, resources (e.g. people, money, knowledge, etc.) are not distributed uniformly."
Rule #20: "Don't assume a fiduciary liability without a committed resource allocation."
Rule #21: "If you do your job and obey the law, they can't reasonably fire you."
Rule #22: "The Budget will always be wrong."
Rule #23: "Always sign in blue."
Rule #24: "A Bureaucrat must be able to explain and justify his/her actions to laymen without resorting to the phrase 'because the Rules say so.'"
Rule #25: "Never voluntarily relinquish control of an original document."
Rule #26: "Sometimes you just have to say 'Screw the rules'"
Rule #27: "Change sucks."
Rule #28: "Sometimes the answer is 'No.'"
Rule #29: "It is very easy to make difficult decisions when no one has a clue what's going on."
Rule #30: "If you hang around long enough, eventually you will become an expert in something."
Rule #31: "Data, technology, and automatic processes can never completely supplant human interaction."
Rule #32: "Cover thine own ass."
Rule #33: "It's not real until it has its own acronym."
Rule #34:There is nothing more dangerous than an elected, resourceful idiot.
Rule #35: It will always take longer than expected.
Rule #36: Coming Soon...

Tuesday, November 25, 2008

A Bureaucrat's Aside

Is the city's transfer tax on property sales really what's driving young folk out of the City of Pittsburgh, as suggested by the Propel Pittsburgh Commission or, as I suspect, (a) a zero sum game to be played with the rest of the region, which itself is losing youth and (b) a tragedy of misguided groupthink?

5 comments:

Anonymous said...: As a young person in Pittsburgh, I would like, with only slight embarrassment, to say, "the city's whoosit whatsit on the thingajagig sales huh?"

It costs a billion times less to live here than anywhere else. I don't think anything called a "transfer tax" is killin' me here.; 2:05 AM
Anonymous said...: I'm on that commission and I don't agree with it.; 7:37 PM
Mark Rauterkus said...: Missed the report. Where is it? Pointer welcomed.

I've said for years that the single worst tax is the deed transfer tax. Is that what they said too?; 9:22 AM
illyrias said...: Completely agreed. I bought a house in Pittsburgh (moving from the East Coast) and I had no idea there was a transfer tax and it really didn't affect the bottom line of what I was buying - it was so reasonable.

I assume this is focused on folks that live in the suburbs and it's just an excuse.

I think we need to recruit city people to live in Pittsburgh. Suburb people are afraid of the crime and the higher prices - valid concerns. City people realize that comes with the benefits of living in the city. Suburb people don't see the benefits.

One change I suggest is that the city actually responded to all the people who applied to be on the Propel Pittsburgh commission. I applied and got absolutely no response.; 10:30 AM
IOZ said...: Pittsburgh doesn't actually have a youth retention problem. It has one of the highest youth retention rates of any major US city. The relative aging of the city has to do with earlier, not current, declines in the young and middle-aged populations. In any event, since "youth" remain a small demographic tranche, it's pretty innumerate to look at their retention or departure as having much to do with larger population declines.

Also, yeah, um, the whodidwhatnowtax? I signed the forms and handed over the big 'ol cashier check. Still beats a million-five for a one-bedroom in San Francisco, or $3,600 a month and 5 roommates in Williamsburg.; 1:35 PM

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The Angry Drunk Bureaucrat

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Tuesday, November 25, 2008

A Bureaucrat's Aside

5 comments:

Recorded in the Office of the Prothonotary

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