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I am looking for the area of statute, CFR, or case law where WIFCON believes the following quote rings most true.  Be objective with facts.  Maybe rely on the Section 809 Report's legwork, but be creative too.

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"[America's core principles include promoting freedom to operate].  Meaning, the least amount of government intervention possible.  This is important because, almost like entropy, the hand of government gets heavier every year.  The laws and regulations accumulate every year, and these laws and regulations are immortal.  So you have to have to an active role in reducing the number of laws and regulations, otherwise as more and more are passed, eventually everything becomes illegal.  Action A is illegal and action B is illegal and there isn’t anything you can do that is legal.”

-Elon Musk, CEO of SpaceX

Alternative, intervention-promoting viewpoints are also welcome here.

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I cannot help you but I did find a Wikipedia article that traces the quoted philosophy back to 1862 Germany. It provides a decent starting point for further research.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Night-watchman_state

 

 

 

 

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Is this thread related to contracting issues or matters? Please see Terms of Use, rule number 8. “No straying from contracting. All discussions must be related, in some way, to contracting issues and must remain on topic.”

It appears to be a request for legal justification to support or argue against a political opinion.

We were once upon a time chided by an esteemed member here for providing legal advice, although that water has long flowed over the bridge.😃

 

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9 hours ago, WifWaf said:

I am looking for the area of statute, CFR, or case law where WIFCON believes the following quote rings most true.  Be objective with facts.  

What is the purpose of this?  Is it for your own edification, a project you are working on, or a paper you are writing?  Responding properly takes some effort so we need to know.

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I am in search of a discussion on a discussion board.  Maybe this topic is about something people are attributing to me from their own pasts or from some other discussion.  You shouldn’t do that, it is demeaning of my life and work.

I am just a CO in search of how to comply with FAR 1.602-1(b).  Seriously - that’s it.

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10 hours ago, WifWaf said:

I am in search of a discussion on a discussion board.  Maybe this topic is about something people are attributing to me from their own pasts or from some other discussion.  You shouldn’t do that, it is demeaning of my life and work.

I am just a CO in search of how to comply with FAR 1.602-1(b).  Seriously - that’s it.

@WifWaf, I didn’t attribute anything to you from my own past or some other discussions. I questioned what this opinion had to do with contracting, caselaw, CFR, etc. and now - how this Elon Musk statement applies in application of complying with FAR 1.602-1(b).

Please clarify/elaborate. Thanks.

“(b) No contract shall be entered into unless the contracting officer ensures that all requirements of law, executive orders, regulations, and all other applicable procedures, including clearances and approvals, have been met.”

 

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21 hours ago, WifWaf said:

I am looking for the area of statute, CFR, or case law where WIFCON believes the following quote rings most true.  Be objective with facts.  Maybe rely on the Section 809 Report's legwork, but be creative too.

Alternative, intervention-promoting viewpoints are also welcome here.

@WifWaf I'm not sure what you're looking for. Your opening and subsequent post are murky, at best. Are you looking for a quote from a statute, regulation, or decision that supports Elon Musk's comment? And what do you mean by "Be objective with facts." Facts are facts.

As for your quote from Elon Musk, at least one senior government official appears to agree with him. See the new book by Supreme Court Associate Justice Neil Gorsuch and Janie Nitze, Overruled: The Human Toll of Too Much Law (2024). And see this from Supreme Court decision Obergefell v. Hodges, 576 U.S. 644, 721 (Thomas's dissent):

Quote

Since well before 1787, liberty has been understood as freedom from government action, not entitlement to government benefits. 

The phrase "freedom from government" appears in 69 Federal circuit courts of appeals decisions. It appears in 190 Federal district court decisions. And see Anderson, " Executive Orders, 'The Very Definition of Tyranny' and the Congressional Solution, The Separation of Powers Restoration Act, in Hastings Constitutional Law Quarterly (Spring 2002).

As for promoting intervention, see "The Power of Procurement: How the United States Should Leverage Its Buying Power to Uphold International Labor Standards and Clean Global Supply Chains", by Sebar Jamal, in the current edition of Public Contract Law Journal (Spring 2024).

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Thank you for trying to wade into my murkiness.  Let me clarify.  No legal advice is requested.  No politics are necessary to prove a truth (quite the opposite).  History is what WIFCON does best, and accurate history can help prove objective truth.  I trust you all to provide accurate history.

As a CO, I like to think it is actually possible to meet my FAR 1.602-1(b) authority and -2(a) responsibility.  However, my counterparts in various industries have to do the actual compliance with these laws and regulations, so my ears perked up when one of them publicly decried the repercussions he experienced meeting the laws that we can assume a CO (and, later, a judge) implemented in his contract.  I am looking to decide if Mr. Musk is being objectively truthful in this instance.

One way we can decide that for ourselves is by comparing his industry operating in the present to that same industry operating in the past.  In doing so we could identify many onerous laws and decide if less of them in the past likely benefited overall output.  That's "freedom to operate" in tangible, unideological terms.  In other words, objective truth.

The quote provided in the OP is likely discussing the onerousness of operating in NAICS 336414 - "Guided Missile and Space Vehicle Manufacturing" 1.  That's been around since the 1960s at least.  What especially problematic statutes, regulations, and case law interpretations have been added to contracts operating in that industry in the past 60 years?  What, if any, have been removed?  Did any small businesses thrive in that NAICS Code due to a particularly onerous law not being applied?

Thank you for the book recommendations, I am looking into them.

https://www.usaspending.gov/search/?hash=20c1055b4757790570616163f6140723

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@WifWaf

Here's your quote of Musk:

On 8/19/2024 at 7:43 AM, WifWaf said:

[America's core principles include promoting freedom to operate].  Meaning, the least amount of government intervention possible.  This is important because, almost like entropy, the hand of government gets heavier every year.  The laws and regulations accumulate every year, and these laws and regulations are immortal.  So you have to have to an active role in reducing the number of laws and regulations, otherwise as more and more are passed, eventually everything becomes illegal.  Action A is illegal and action B is illegal and there isn’t anything you can do that is legal.

Six sentences. From them I extracted the following statements asserted to be facts:

  1. America's core principles include promoting freedom to operate.
  2. The hand of government gets heavier every year.
  3. The laws and regulations accumulate every year.
  4. The laws and regulations are immortal.

I take the following to be a reasonable interpretation of 1.

     Meaning, the least amount of government intervention possible.

The following is purely rhetorical prediction, not a statement of fact:

     If you don't actively reduce the number of laws and regulations, everything will be illegal.

I say that 1, 2, and 3 are true.

For the truth of 1, see the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and any number of Supreme Court decisions.

2 and 3 say essentially the same thing, and 3 is demonstrably true. See Gorsuch's book for the facts.

I say that 4 is demonstrably false.

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9 hours ago, WifWaf said:

I dunno, 29 CFR Part 9, “Nondisplacement of Qualified Workers Under Service Contracts” seems immortal to me.  Or undead.

Laws and regulations are enacted, published, revised, and repealed the time. They are not "immortal" and it's stupid to say so. Not even the Constitution is immortal.

Are you done?

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40 minutes ago, Vern Edwards said:

They are not "immortal" and it's stupid to say so.

Quote

The Chicken Tax is a 25% trade tariff (tax) originally imposed on brandy, dextrin, potato starch, and light trucks imported into the United States from other countries. Intended to restrict the importation of those goods, the Chicken Tax was imposed by President Lyndon Johnson in 1963 as a response to a similar tariff placed by West Germany and France on chicken meat imported from the United States. While the Chicken Tax tariff on brandy, dextrin, and potato starch was lifted years ago, the tariff on imported light trucks and cargo vans remains in place in an effort to protect U.S. automakers from foreign competition.

The Chicken Tax: Origins and Impact (thoughtco.com)

You're being disingenuous. Nothing is immortal, so you are certainly correct in the most pedantic way possible, however I'm fairly certain that no one took that statement to mean that any regulation enacted today will still be around when the sun goes supernova. According to you my professors at the GWU Graduate School of Business were also obviously stupid, because the tendency of regulations to persist once enacted was an axiom throughout the entire Business and Government Relations curriculum.

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@REA'n Maker To say that I am "certainly correct" in a "pedantic" way is laughable. And business school professors are never wrong. Right? (I'm sure that's axiomatic in business schools.)

If you want to complain about the persistence of laws and regulations, try making an intelligent analysis instead of schoolyard complaints. And in doing so try not to say things like "Regulations are enacted through FAR clauses... " Did you learn that at the GWU Graduate School of Business?

Immortal means "Not subject to death." American Heritage Dictionary, 5th ed. A "tendency to persist" and being long-lived are not the same as immortal. In this country, laws can be, and are, amended or repealed, and regulations can be, and are, revised and withdrawn.

The gold standard for U.S. currency (1834) was abandoned in 1971. The Armed Services Procurement Regulation (1949) was canceled in 1984. The Service Contract Act of 1965 has been amended several times, as has the Davis Bacon Act. Executive orders, like the Chicken Tax, can be, and have been, revised or withdrawn. OMB Circular A-76 (1966) was revised many times and is now under a Congressional "moratorium". The graveyard of laws, regulations, and policies is huge. Remember when GSBCA had bid protest authority?

Case law can be overturned, stare decisis notwithstanding, as many have recently learned to their shock. Roe v. Wade (1973) was long-lived. Chevron (1984) was long-lived, and its death is likely to produce many shocks. More long-standing case law is likely to be be overturned in the next session of the current Supreme Court.

As long as there is a chance for change there is hope (and fear). Statutory repeal and deregulation have happened and will happen again.

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On 8/21/2024 at 12:38 PM, formerfed said:

The Service Contract Act, enacted nearly 60 years ago, has a threshold of $2,500.

On 8/21/2024 at 5:06 PM, joel hoffman said:

Davis-Bacon threshold is similarly enshrined at $2000

And the resulting complexities are daunting today.  Were they ever less daunting?

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1 hour ago, WifWaf said:

And the resulting complexities are daunting today.  Were they ever less daunting?

Yes, when $2000 was a much larger purchase(scope). Inflation has made it applicable to very small efforts.

Many thresholds are now adjusted for inflation. But not these labor related ones. It’s ridiculous. 

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3 hours ago, joel hoffman said:

Many thresholds are now adjusted for inflation. But not these labor related ones. It’s ridiculous. 

I  think the SCA and D-B thresholds should be raised, but it's a political question, not an administrative one, and it (arguably) affects the interests and well-being of workers, who outrank bureaucrats, now and in the foreseeable future.

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A $2,000 dollar construction effort now days could involve an hour or two worth of labor to install something. Does that mean obtaining a wage decision and payrolls, etc, etc?

The threshold isnt based solely on the cost of labor…

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What about the addition of 29 CFR Part 13, effective January 2017 and incorporated into all CONUS SCA/DBA contracts via FAR 52.222-62.  This change still makes my head hurt reading SCLS WDs.  At what point is federal work no longer free to operate for the high school graduate with a dream?

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7 hours ago, joel hoffman said:

A $2,000 dollar construction effort now days could involve an hour or two worth of labor to install something. Does that mean obtaining a wage decision and payrolls, etc, etc?

 

5 hours ago, WifWaf said:

What about the addition of 29 CFR Part 13, effective January 2017 and incorporated into all contracts via FAR 52.222-62.  This change still makes my head hurt reading SCLS WDs.  

Are those supposed to be arguments that might persuade Congress to repeal or revise a law that is actually or symbolically important to a politically powerful constituency like labor?

Is that all you've got? Bureaucratic inconvenience and confusion?

Surely, Joel, you can do better. (I'm not sure about WifWaf.) Why don't you stop posting and think about it?

How is the present dollar threshold for Davis-Bacon bad for the system and the country? What's your argument?

😂

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What good does applying Davis-Bacon, essentially requiring Union labor rates to simple tasks, that may take a couple of hours to perform, provide the country, labor or the system?

The “system” has recently reverted to determining, in practice,   “prevailing wage rates” based on local Union rates, even where union labor is a small fraction of the labor force. DOL stopped doing that probably 20-25 years ago. Now it’s back.

Bureaucratic inconvenience?????? Come on Vern. Unnecessary, wasteful complexity for minuscule tasks that doesn’t effect any real difference in a workers pay.

Most small construction tasks are performed by small businesses, who likely aren’t unionized  in most parts of the country. Union contractors probably won’t even bother contracting for such small jobs. 

$2000 total cost is minuscule in scale. Why over complicate it.

I could talk for days about dealing with the Tri-City, Washington unionized labor force at Umatilla, Oregon that built the Chemical Weapons Demil Plant. (Example: three electricians carrying a 20’ , 3/4” piece of electrical conduit that probably weighs 5 pounds or less across the site from a storage trailer… the prime had electrical labor overruns of 165% on a huge FFP contract that affected the other trade productivity.)

 

 

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1 hour ago, joel hoffman said:

Unnecessary, wasteful complexity...

"Unnecessary" depends on your point of view. But please provide a specific example of the "wasteful complexity" of Davis-Bacon. What's so hard about paying a specified minimum wage and maintaining payroll records? What is complex and what is the waste?

I'm not disagreeing with you. I'm just asking for specifics that will explain your point of view. D-B seems like more of a problem for big contracts than for small ones.

Remember, I once ran the construction shop for the Bonneville Power Administration.

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