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Americans Worry, Wonder What Happened to Gov Social Services

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My friend Chris Edwards from Cato Institute has written at Downsizinggovernment.org that “Only one-third of people think that the government gives competent service, and the public’s “customer satisfaction” with federal services is lower than for virtually all private services.” It’s not surprising that Americans have lost faith in government as it always seems they’re paying more and getting less from Uncle Sam.

Edwards continues:

NextGov.com reports today on a new customer satisfaction study:

Despite a major push by the Obama administration in recent years, the federal government “still fails at customer experience,” according to Forrester Research’s Customer Experience Index.

The federal government finished dead last among 21 major industries, and had five of the eight worst scores of the 319 brands, leading Forrester to note that government has a “near monopoly on the worst experiences.”

Notably, HealthCare.gov ranked last among all brands … USAJobs.gov, the departments of Education and Veterans Affairs, the Transportation Security Administration, the Internal Revenue Service, Medicaid and the Small Business Administration rated in the bottom 6 percent of all brands.

This was not a small-sample poll. Forrester’s Index was based on perceptions from surveys of 122,500 adult customers.

“For me, the most compelling point is that federal agencies are clustered near the bottom of the index,” Rick Parrish, senior analyst at Forrester, told Nextgov. “So many agencies that have been working hard haven’t shown improvement. You see a lot of action, a lot of arm-waving and noise, but not a lot of progress.” Even the worst brands in the worst industries—TV and internet service providers, and some airlines—generally outperformed federal agencies.

An irony of Big Government is that even as Congress has created hundreds of new programs to supposedly help people, and dishes out more than $2 trillion a year in subsidies, the public has not grown fonder of the government. Instead, people have become more alienated from it, and more disgusted by its poor performance.

For more from Chris on Why the Federal Government Fails, read his study below:

Download (PDF, 774KB)

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E.J. Smith - Your Survival Guy

Preparing your investments and family for when disaster strikes.
E.J. Smith is the Founder of YourSurvivalGuy.com, Managing Director at Richard C. Young & Co., Ltd., a Managing Editor of Richardcyoung.com, and Editor-in-Chief of Youngresearch.com. E.J. graduated from Babson College in Wellesley, Massachusetts, with a B.S. in finance and investments. In 1995, E.J. began his investment career at Fidelity Investments in Boston before joining Richard C. Young & Co., Ltd. in 1998. E.J. has trained at Sig Sauer Academy in Epping, NH, where he completed course-work in Practical and Defensive Handgun, Conceal Carry Pistol, Shotguns, Precision Scope Rifle and Kidnapping Prevention. E.J. plays a Yamaha Recording Custom drum set with Zilldjian cymbals. His first drum set was a 5-piece Slingerland with Zilldjians. He grew-up worshiping Neil Peart of the band Rush, and loves the song Tom Sawyer—the name of his family’s boat, a Grady-White Canyon 306. He grew up in Mattapoisett, MA, an idyllic small town on the water near Cape Cod. He spends time in Newport, RI and Bartlett, NH—both as far away from Wall Street as one could mentally get. The Newport office is on a quiet, tree lined street not far from the harbor and the log cabin in Bartlett, NH, the “Live Free or Die” state, sits on the edge of the White Mountain National Forest. He enjoys spending time in Key West and Paris. Please get in touch with E.J. at ejsmith@youngresearch.com. Sign up here to receive all the best content from Richardcyoung.com each week.

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