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Abstract
The Clinton Administration has lived up to its promise to cut the federal workforce. Currently, there are 250,000 fewer federal employees than at the start of the Clinton Administration in January 1993. Another 25,000 should be gone by 1999 - for a cut of nearly 12%. However, the unanswered question is whether the agencies will vitiate the savings ($61 billion according to the Congressional Budget Office) by outsourcing functions formerly performed by government workers. Vice President Gore, who has been spearheading the effort, is shifting his focus from sweeping reforms to working with a limited number of agencies or individual units within agencies. His goal is to convert them into performance-based organizations. The Administration faces 3 major obstacles: 1. personnel and budgetary systems, 2. distrust, and 3. personnel.