A recently published Harvard Study noted that higher than 20% of all government contracts are entered into in the last month of the US fiscal year (September 30th). The report noted that when analyzing problems with these contracts (The US did a study for IT contracts), the Government Administrative Office (GAO) discovered that problems with these contracts were 500% greater than contracts signed any other time of the year.
The government also noted that the Justice Department, which allows budgets to flow into the first few months of the next year, did not experience the same problem. Apparently, unless the money is spent during the current year, for good or waste, the bureaucrats fear they will have their budgets cut. As a result, 20% of all money is spent in the last month of the year and of that amount, there is 5 times more problems than contracts entered any other time. And with all these glaring problems, only the Justice department thought of an intelligent solution! That is scary!
