I'm' retired now but gotta laugh at the "government employees are union which makes cutting the fat neatly impossible" I don't know about the rest of govt., but at King County it was nearly impossible to keep the staff necessary to provide the services demanded by KC residents.
Whether directly serving residents (like Public Health or Transit) or internal support agencies like IT, we were all searching for better ways to provide services with less staff because there just wasn't funding for the positions.
There was a time back in the 70s and 80s (I'm told) where they were fat with staff (same time period when they called Boeing the Lazy B). But ever since I started in the 90s we were at the bleeding edge of staff. You were expected to be doing a full time job and half of someone else's just to keep your position.
The 'lazy govt employee' is an enduring fallacy where people seem to look at how long, and how many public service employees, it takes to accomplish a project and make statements like "Me and Bubba could have had that done in 2 hrs and it took them a week!". These employees take so long typically because of all the processes and red tape they have to follow.
I'll tell you what really bleeds govt resources and it's usually some dimwit manager or director not understanding why some processes take so long and wanting to make things easier/cheaper. They make changes based on their simplistic vision and end up FUBARing a working process and causing endless headaches and wasted time for those around them. I could tell you stories of failed payroll systems that cost the taxpayers millions.
The same situation exists in public utilities and private industry. Just look at Seattle City Light- they didn't provide for fish passage on their dams by claiming migratory salmonids did not utilize habitat above the dams (the cheap option). Now Tribes have successfully sued them and they'll have to retrofit fish passage. Millions of dollars and guess who gets to pay??? Seattle City Light customers.
Govt will get your money, whether in sales and property tax (WA), income and property tax (OR).
Here's a conundrum for you - a hypothetical state govt charges a high license tab fee on vehicles and the money in part supports highway maintenance. People complain so they reduce the tab costs by half and sell all the good highways to private entities who then charge tolls to use their roads.
It's a for-profit enterprise, so the fees are 5 - $10 and you may go thru several tolls on a long trip. But the alternative is to use the pothole ridden backroads. Are you happy? After all, taxes went down.
IMHO, there's no easy answer. Whether public or private, corrupt/incompetent leaders seem to be a recurring theme we can't escape.
