RONALD REAGAN FIRES 11,359 AIR‑TRAFFIC CONTROLLERS … A PRECEDENT PERHAPS

On August 5, 1981, President Ronald Reagan begins firing 11,359 air-traffic controllersstriking in violation of his order for them to return to work. The executive action, regarded as extreme by many, significantly slowed air travel for months.
Two days earlier, on August 3, almost 13,000 air-traffic controllers went on strike after negotiations with the federal government to raise their pay and shorten their workweek proved fruitless. The controllers complained of difficult working conditions and a lack of recognition of the pressures they face. Across the country, some 7,000 flights were canceled. The same day, President Reagan called the strike illegal and threatened to fire any controller who had not returned to work within 48 hours. Robert Poli, president of the Professional Air-Traffic Controllers Association (PATCO), was found in contempt by a federal judge and ordered to pay $1,000 a day in fines.
On August 5, an angry President Reagan carried out his threat, and the federal government began firing the 11,359 air-traffic controllers who had not returned to work. In addition, he declared a lifetime ban on the rehiring of the strikers by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA). On August 17, the FAA began accepting applications for new air-traffic controllers, and on October 22 the Federal Labor Relations Authority decertified PATCO.

DRAIN THE SWAMP FOR THE ECONOMIC BENEFITS … A UNION IS NOT A FLOATATION DEVICE … BUT DOGE MAY OFFER AN INCENTIVE!

December 6, 2024

The exact number of federal agencies in the U.S. government varies depending on the definition and classification used. The U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) identified about 440 federal agencies and sub-agencies in a 2021 report. However, other estimates place the number of primary agencies at about 100 to 130, depending on whether certain smaller or independent bodies are included.

Federal agencies are broadly categorized into:

Executive Departments (e.g., Department of Defense, Department of Education), which are headed by Cabinet members.
Independent Agencies (e.g., NASA, EPA), which operate outside the Cabinet structure.
Regulatory Commissions (e.g., SEC, FCC), which oversee specific industries or practices.
Government Corporations (e.g., USPS, Amtrak), which provide services commercially.

Each classification includes many sub-agencies and offices, contributing to the complexity of determining an exact number. For the most comprehensive and official list, you can refer to the U.S. Government Manual, which provides detailed organizational charts and descriptions.

There’s not much Donald Trump could ever do as president that will generate more resistance and hatred than bleeding the fetid capital swamp. It’s arguable that there’s nothing he could ever do as president that would be better for the republic.

Trump’s decision to make administration appointments from figures who are outside of the establishment adds to the loathing that so many in the political-media establishment already directed toward him. Various grifters, vipers and unprincipled schemers from both parties have spent their adult lives seeking seats of power, comfort and endless tenure in the capital. To see the secretarial positions, directorships, administrator posts and bureaucratic jobs that they have for years lusted after filled by outsiders makes them angry. No one should feel sorry for them, though. They are a drag on both our civic health and our economy.

In regard to the latter, the damage is more extensive that most would ever guess. A research paper updated during the first year of Trump’s initial term that measured the “cost per regulator” in the bureaucracy reached some appalling yet unsurprising conclusions about Washington’s impact on the private sector. According to the authors, “one regulator costs the U.S. economy the equivalent of 138 private-sector jobs per year.”

Here are a few more choice findings from the paper. In addition to these check with "Out of Office" … for some insightful motivational items.

“Each $1 million change in the regulatory budget is associated with a change of about four regulator jobs.”
“A 10% cut in the regulatory budget results in a loss of 21,756 regulatory jobs.”
That same cut “provides for an additional $1.2 trillion in GDP annually over the five-year window, or $244 billion annually.”
“Each regulator costs the U.S. economy $11 million annually.”

The root cause is, of course, overregulation. Trump needs to continue the deregulatory agenda he promised during his first term, when he said he was committed to cutting the regulatory federal regulatory framework by 75%.

Naturally the Swamp creatures are bitterly opposed, as are the media, which have a thriving parasitic and symbiotic relationship with the administrative system. The Washington Post, for instance, darkly warns that the “most immediate impact” of Trump’s newly created Department of Government Efficiency could “could be to demoralize the federal workforce and increase attrition.”

“Budget experts say the [efficiency] effort could prove hugely disruptive to workers and businesses that rely on certainty in federal regulation and spending,” reports the Post.

Which means corporate rent seekers and industry moochers will have to compete, and competition is always the friend of the consumer – and the more heated it is, the greater the advantages for buyers.

Disrupting the federal regulation machine will also fuel investment and innovation, the keys to economic growth. There’s much for Trump to do over the next four years, but outside of saving us from being overrun by our enemies from without and within, it’s the most important thing he can do.