Orszag Hints at Flat Budgets

Office of Management and Budget Director Peter Orszag spoke at a Government Executive leadership breakfast on Tuesday and talked about the Obama administration's effort to close the federal government's "IT gap," a situation in which many agencies work on computer systems -- or on no systems at all -- that are woefully behind what the private sector has. (As an illustration, he showed a photo of what he called "the cave" in Pennsylvania, where federal employee records are stored in row upon row of metal file cabinets. Loose wires dangled from the ceiling.)

With the IT gap, "it's impossible to move to a new level of productivity" in government, he said.

But don't expect an increase in the $80 billion federal IT budget to fill that gap, Orszag said. "I'm not sure we need more money," he explained. We need "better management of the money we are already spending." The Obama administration proposed a relatively flat IT budget for fiscal 2011.

When asked if he was ruling out more money for IT in the future, Orszag replied, "I'm not ruling out more. . . . But more money isn't always the solution and can be counterproductive because it doesn't force choices that lead to more efficiency."