Simple ways gov could save money

BabySlam

My suggestion would be to change from mailing payslips to employees/pensioners and just send these by email.
(Wonder what it costs to envelope and mail payslips to all teachers etc)

AndyBoBandy

BabySlam wrote: »

My suggestion would be to change from mailing payslips to employees/pensioners and just send these by email.
(Wonder what it costs to envelope and mail payslips to all teachers etc)

A drop in the ocean overall, but nevertheless an ocean is made up of drops, and they'd all start to add up with more simple ideas like this.

L1011

Most public sector payslips have been electronic for ages. The software isn't free if the existing one doesn't support it though

Permabear

This post has been deleted.

nice_guy80

No ministers for a few months

That would work

newacc2015

BabySlam wrote: »

My suggestion would be to change from mailing payslips to employees/pensioners and just send these by email.
(Wonder what it costs to envelope and mail payslips to all teachers etc)

Except An Post would lose it. They rely on the state being unable to manage its own services for a source of revenue eg collecting TV Licence, Prize bonds, managing social welfare

A really simple way to save money on medicine is using a standardised doctor prescription pad. On that the pad you have a box for use generic medicine unless this box is ticked. Some American prescription pads have this on it, as most patients wont ask for generic medicines. They have to opt out on generics on these pads.

LeinsterDub

newacc2015 wrote: »

A really simple way to save money on medicine is using a standardised doctor prescription pad. On that the pad you have a box for use generic medicine unless this box is ticked. Some American prescription pads have this on it, as most patients wont ask for generic medicines. They have to opt out on generics on these pads.

If you are getting medicine free from the state then you shouldn't have the option to choose non generic

newacc2015

LeinsterDub wrote: »

If you are getting medicine free from the state then you shouldn't have the option to choose non generic

There is a large majority who think they shouldnt have to take generic medicines. We have some of the lowest use of generic medicines in Europe

Jellybaby1

BabySlam wrote: »

This post had been deleted.

Pensioners probably wouldn't be getting payslips anyway though.

Permabear wrote: »

This post has been deleted.

All my pensioner friends are very adept at using computers, some in their 80's. I accept that some have never touched a computer. Hard to believe that younger people in their 40's avoid computers like a plague, but it happens.

Permabear

This post has been deleted.

Tabnabs

I'd slash the €310m gross budget for Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht to the bone. The tax payer shouldn't have to subsidise people working in arts.

€6m a week, every week of the year. We can't afford it, nor is it justifiable.

Jellybaby1

Tabnabs wrote: »

I'd slash the €310m gross budget for Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht to the bone. The tax payer shouldn't have to subsidise people working in arts.

€6m a week, every week of the year. We can't afford it, nor is it justifiable.

I would look at that from another angle. When they give a grant, they should make sure that people brought in to work in arts projects are actually being paid! And I don't mean only those who apply for the grants. I know many projects can get funded but when you dig deep you find the little people were actually 'volunteers'!

Speedwell

LeinsterDub wrote: »

If you are getting medicine free from the state then you shouldn't have the option to choose non generic

But your GP should be able to specify it. "Generic" is not always the same production quality or formulation of inactive ingredients as the "brand" version. Sometimes that's important.

Speedwell

Speaking as a database professional, one simple way for the government to save money is to clean up their data... remove duplicates, consolidate records, manage errors, modernize obsolete processes, more effectively manage access, reconsider interface design.

Squall Leonhart

Step down welfare payments for the unemployed incrementally after say 12mths, 18mths, 24mths, 30mths & 36mths, 10% at a time.

At current rates that'd be;
€188 a week up to 12mths
€169 a week up to 18mths
€150 a week up to 24mths
€132 a week up to 30mths
€113 a week up to 36mths
€94 a week after 36mths.

This would save a lot of money, help those legitimately out of work and discourage people making a lifestyle of being on benefits. Yes I'm sure there would be genuine people who would lose out in this, but I feel they'd be in the minority and the benefits as a whole would be greater than any disadvantages.

oscarBravo

Squall Leonhart wrote: »

Yes I'm sure there would be genuine people who would lose out in this, but I feel they'd be in the minority and the benefits as a whole would be greater than any disadvantages.

...and, as we all know, discriminating against minorities is perfectly fine.

Squall Leonhart

oscarBravo wrote: »

...and, as we all know, discriminating against minorities is perfectly fine.

That's not what I'm saying and you know well it's not! No welfare system is going to perfectly cater to everybody's needs. It doesn't at present and it wouldn't if altered to my suggestion.

mfceiling

Put road tax on to fuel.

No more tax offices. No more discs. No more checkpoints for it. The more you drive the more you pay. Everyone pays...no loopholes.

hardCopy

newacc2015 wrote: »

A really simple way to save money on medicine is using a standardised doctor prescription pad. On that the pad you have a box for use generic medicine unless this box is ticked. Some American prescription pads have this on it, as most patients wont ask for generic medicines. They have to opt out on generics on these pads.

It would probably make sense to get rid of pads altogether. How many benzos would be taken off the street if stolen and forged scripts were taken out of the game?

No doubt a central prescription portal would end up in an absolute horlicks of scandal and blown budgets though.

Esel

Speedwell wrote: »

But your GP should be able to specify it. "Generic" is not always the same production quality or formulation of inactive ingredients as the "brand" version. Sometimes that's important.

Production quality - surely all licensed generics meet the necessary standards?

Inactive ingredients - how would these impact efficacy?

Can you give examples?

oscarBravo

Squall Leonhart wrote: »

That's not what I'm saying and you know well it's not! No welfare system is going to perfectly cater to everybody's needs. It doesn't at present and it wouldn't if altered to my suggestion.

There's a difference between perfectly catering to everybody's needs, and destroying some people's lives on the basis that the country would be better off.

You could save a fortune on social welfare by picking a quarter of recipients at random and stopping their payments. Would that be OK? After all, it only affects a minority of claimants.

Yes, it's a stupid analogy. That's the point. You don't "improve" a system by destroying a small number of people's lives and shrugging them off as inconsequential in the greater scheme of things.

maryishere

Stop retired politicians drawing on their political pensions until the age the rest of us can get our meagre pension i.e. 68.

Abolish the Seanad.

Reduce the number of TD's. There are far too many for a country of only 4.6 million or whatever.

Reduce the salary of the President. Did you know the President of Spain gets paid less than half of what ours earns.

newacc2015

Speedwell wrote: »

But your GP should be able to specify it. "Generic" is not always the same production quality or formulation of inactive ingredients as the "brand" version. Sometimes that's important.

Have you heard about how GPs prescribe antibiotics for people who dont actually need them? If you study junior cert science you know that antibiotics are useless for colds, as they are a virus. Yet GP give scripts all the time for colds, as they are afraid patients will switch GPs if they dont do what their patients tell them to do.

It is a myth that all generics are inferior. They are generally produced to the same standards.

http://www.fda.gov/drugs/resourcesforyou/consumers/buyingusingmedicinesafely/understandinggenericdrugs/ucm167991.htm

Esel

maryishere wrote: »

Stop retired politicians drawing on their political pensions until the age the rest of us can get our meagre pension i.e. 68.

Abolish the Seanad.

Reduce the number of TD's. There are far too many for a country of only 4.6 million or whatever.

Reduce the salary of the President. Did you know the President of Spain gets paid less than half of what ours earns gets.

FYP

Don't agree with the 68 thing - is that the current pension qualification age?

maryishere

Esel wrote: »

FYP

Don't agree with the 68 thing - is that the current pension qualification age?

It will increase to 67 years in 2021 and to 68 years in 2028.

LionelNashe

Some interesting figures here:

http://www.per.gov.ie/en/expenditure-trends/

Current spending didn't really change that much in the last 7 years (down about 10%) but capital spending was halved.

I don't know about running a country, but I know that in terms of personal finances, you have to invest in things that will hold their value and even give you a return on investment, as opposed to things that will lose value (like your car, your TV, and so on)

I would say that the best way to save money is to prioritize capital projects that give you long term savings on your current expenditure. One example that springs to mind is more social housing, as an alternative to expensive prefabs and paying to put people up in hotels.

Also continue to roll out free GP care, but install a nationwide system of centralized health data, so that illness can be detected and treated early, or (even better) prevented altogether. It's cheaper in the long run to prevent illness rather than hospitalize people who have been caught unawares by the cancer or the kidney disease that was growing undetected for the previous years.

Esel

^ Yeah, *maybe* we should have been counter-cyclical all along.

That would have implied having strong regulation.

But then we would never have heard of Charlie McCreevey, or the Irish Press, or CJ ("I didn't get where I am today... "), or anybody devious or cunning, or modern gombeen men (they are almost always men), or the Inda pendants, or a well-hung Dail, or JCMcQ, tribunals, ranchers, trolleys, crossroads dancing, ballroom romancing, and all the rest of it.

Happy eutopia? Who knew? They did, and we were done.








Edit: Click here if you are not redirected in 50 years.







Edit #2: Note to self: Calm down, Noel Browne.

StupidLikeAFox

maryishere wrote: »

Stop retired politicians drawing on their political pensions until the age the rest of us can get our meagre pension i.e. 68. .

This is currently the case. The last government brought it in.

StupidLikeAFox

Speedwell wrote: »

Speaking as a database professional, one simple way for the government to save money is to clean up their data... remove duplicates, consolidate records, manage errors, modernize obsolete processes, more effectively manage access, reconsider interface design.

That does not sound simple at all!

Esel

StupidLikeAFox wrote: »

That does not sound simple at all!

Simplez!

Third form normalisation or somethingz. Eazy peazy lemon squeezie.

Start at A, finish at Z. Then go backwards. Rinse and repeat. Any spare letters? No? Job done.

endacl

mfceiling wrote: »

Put road tax on to fuel.

No more tax offices. No more discs. No more checkpoints for it. The more you drive the more you pay. Everyone pays...no loopholes.

No new taxes! :mad:

I already pay motor tax. I'm not paying road tax as well.

On a less flippant note, how does this save money, from the point of view of the state?

Esel

endacl wrote:

On a less flippant note, how does this save money, from the point of view of the state?

Everybody pays - apart from the vegetable oil burners, home growers, and smugglers.

Speedwell

StupidLikeAFox wrote: »

That does not sound simple at all!

It's a lot simpler and less controversial, not to mention effective and compassionate and probably quicker, than stealing bread out of the mouths of the poor, FFS.

AndyBoBandy

endacl wrote: »

On a less flippant note, how does this save money, from the point of view of the state?

They don't have to administer/issue tax disc's anymore, the motor tax office becomes redundant.

your motor tax is loaded onto your fuel at the pump.

if you drive an economical car (or even just drive economically), you buy less fuel - pay less tax.
if you drive a 4.0 Jag/Range Rover (like a tool, or even just normally), you use a lot more fuel, you pay a lot more tax.

Speedwell

AndyBoBandy wrote: »

They don't have to administer/issue tax disc's anymore, the motor tax office becomes redundant.

your motor tax is loaded onto your fuel at the pump.

if you drive an economical car, you buy less fuel - pay less tax.
you drive a 4.0 Jag/Range Rover, you use a lot more fuel, you pay a lot more tax.

That just makes too damn much sense.

AndyBoBandy

Speedwell wrote: »

That just makes too damn much sense.

hence it will never see the light of day.

the groutch

remove the approx €600m in overseas aid in it's current form, and replace it with an optional (on an opt-in basis) PAYE deduction.

Sam Russell

Squall Leonhart wrote: »

Step down welfare payments for the unemployed incrementally after say 12mths, 18mths, 24mths, 30mths & 36mths, 10% at a time.

At current rates that'd be;
€188 a week up to 12mths
€169 a week up to 18mths
€150 a week up to 24mths
€132 a week up to 30mths
€113 a week up to 36mths
€94 a week after 36mths.

This would save a lot of money, help those legitimately out of work and discourage people making a lifestyle of being on benefits. Yes I'm sure there would be genuine people who would lose out in this, but I feel they'd be in the minority and the benefits as a whole would be greater than any disadvantages.

better solution would be to provide a job for those unemployed.

After 12 months on the dole, everyone is offered a job of 20 hours per week at the national minimum rate. I know there would be problems with this, but it should work.

I have yet to go into public buildings that collect tax or pay out dole that are clean, or have clean windows.

There are many people who live alone and need company (such as the very old who have limited mobility) for example. People on benefits could be given the task of filling that gap.

There are many activities in this country that do not happen because they cannot get staff. Well here is a resource.

Speedwell

newacc2015 wrote: »

Have you heard about how GPs prescribe antibiotics for people who dont actually need them? If you study junior cert science you know that antibiotics are useless for colds, as they are a virus. Yet GP give scripts all the time for colds, as they are afraid patients will switch GPs if they dont do what their patients tell them to do.

It is a myth that all generics are inferior. They are generally produced to the same standards.

http://www.fda.gov/drugs/resourcesforyou/consumers/buyingusingmedicinesafely/understandinggenericdrugs/ucm167991.htm

I did not say all generics were inferior. I said they were different. Very often, other "inactive" ingredients are used, or a different but "equivalent" variation of the main ingredient. If you were a pharmacist, you'd know that certain people need a certain specific formulation. Imagine being someone who is allergic to an excipient used in one company's formula! I also know many thyroid patients who need a specific type of medication because it is obtained from natural sources and not produced "synthetically", and others who seem to do better with the synthetic and not the natural formulation. Some diabetics on various formulations of metformin hydrochloride (brand name Glucophage) find their stomach upset is much worse on some generics than others (I can take any of them without trouble... my brother is extremely sensitive though and this matters to him). Some doctors seem not to have caught on to this, and the patients suffer.

CIARAN_BOYLE

If they could cut the institutional procrastination from the public service it would be a start. I know of a state body that had €4 million on deposit at .001% for 18 months while reviewing the situation and considering where to invest it. It is now invested at between 1.5% and 2.5% per annum and the body is making €80,000 a year (small potatoes in the grand scheme but enough to cover the activities of this body, which has one employee and rents a cubicle in a major hospital from the hospital). The fact that it took 18 months to make this change is the waste.

JustTheOne

AndyBoBandy wrote: »

They don't have to administer/issue tax disc's anymore, the motor tax office becomes redundant.

your motor tax is loaded onto your fuel at the pump.

if you drive an economical car (or even just drive economically), you buy less fuel - pay less tax.
if you drive a 4.0 Jag/Range Rover (like a tool, or even just normally), you use a lot more fuel, you pay a lot more tax.

That's already happens, if you have to fill up more you're paying more tax, and vice versa.

AndyBoBandy

JustTheOne wrote: »

That's already happens, if you have to fill up more you're paying more tax, and vice versa.

yes as V.A.T. , but completely remove motor tax, and add it onto the fuel at the pump,

so fuel becomes more expensive at the pump, but people are no longer paying motor tax, which would be fairer in my opinion.

onrail

Easy one to start - peg Public Sector salaries to those private sector.

In my line of work (Engineering) public sector are paid 10-20% more than equivalent roles in the private sector... and have a much less stressful time of it.

Even if pay levels were similar, I'm confident that 90% of those in the private sector would jump at the chance to take a public job!

Sam Russell

AndyBoBandy wrote: »

yes as V.A.T. , but completely remove motor tax, and add it onto the fuel at the pump,

so fuel becomes more expensive at the pump, but people are no longer paying motor tax, which would be fairer in my opinion.

This has been argued out on the motors forum.

If Motor Tax is put onto fuel, it adds about 30c to 50c per litre. [more for diesel as they do more km per litre] and it would incentivise people filling up across the border unless NI could be persuaded to do the same. [unlikely].

It could be added to insurance which would pass the cost of collection onto insurance companies - that might work.

Motor tax has the advantage of keeping tabs on vehicles - not perfect but does give some control. NPRC (number plate reading camera) should be more widely used - for example every Garda squad car should be able to check every vehicle in front and behind for tax, insurance, NCT, and stolen status. That should help cut down on such matters.

On that theme, maybe there should be special courts (District Court level) to deal solely with motoring offences. This would make decisions more even, and parameters for such decisions could be set out by the Courts Service to prevent the nonsense decisions coming from some District Courts. Perhaps the model used by the Small Claims Court could be used as an example - no legal representation, paper based evidence, etc. It just beggars belief that a Romanian defendant can get off a drink driving case solely because the documentation was not in the Irish language. [I know nothing about the case and I am not judging it, only the judges].

What do we do in 20 years time when most of the cars are electric?

Are we to put motor tax onto electricity too?

Speedwell

Deleted User wrote: »

What do we do in 20 years time when most of the cars are electric?

Are we to put motor tax onto electricity too?

It wouldn't be unimaginably difficult to make the car itself report how many units of electricity were used to "fill" it over a period of time.

Speedwell

Speedwell wrote: »

It wouldn't be unimaginably difficult to make the car itself report how many units of electricity were used to "fill" it over a period of time.

Tax inspectors at every ferry port to log the meter readings of cars coming on and off the island?

Border stations in the North?

(I'm playing devil's advocate here, I'm very interested in the proposals, just teasing out the issues up the road)

Speedwell

Deleted User wrote: »

Tax inspectors at every ferry port to log the meter readings of cars coming on and off the island?

I was thinking more like a computerised sensor that read the information from the car's system as it drove past, not terribly unlike automatic toll road systems.

Speedwell

Speedwell wrote: »

I was thinking more like a computerised sensor that read the information from the car's system as it drove past, not terribly unlike automatic toll road systems.

Automatic Readers on every crossing from NI to ROI and at every ferry port? That's a lot of technology and infrastructure to buy and maintain!

Not to mention the requirement for 2 million in-car readers that would have to be tamper-proofed.

Godge

AndyBoBandy wrote: »

They don't have to administer/issue tax disc's anymore, the motor tax office becomes redundant.

your motor tax is loaded onto your fuel at the pump.

if you drive an economical car (or even just drive economically), you buy less fuel - pay less tax.
if you drive a 4.0 Jag/Range Rover (like a tool, or even just normally), you use a lot more fuel, you pay a lot more tax.

So let me get this right.

The single male banker on the fat salary who can afford to change his car every year for the latest €60k efficient model and only drives to and from work (buses are for little people and taxis at the weekend) pays very little motor tax.

On the other hand, the widowed mother of five, driving a 20-year old inefficient banger of a mini-bus pays a fortune in motor tax.

Am I getting that right?

Zillah

Tabnabs wrote: »

I'd slash the €310m gross budget for Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht to the bone. The tax payer shouldn't have to subsidise people working in arts.

€6m a week, every week of the year. We can't afford it, nor is it justifiable.

It's a lot of money, I'll concede. But not everything worthwhile turns a profit. Should we save a sliver of the national budget now, and risk letting the Irish language die out forever? Do we not want to encourage Irish painters, writers, sculptors, etc, to apply their craft? I can't assign a numerical value to the artistic output of the last few generations of creative Irish people, but wouldn't it be very sad if we were the generation that let it die out?

How many talented people are languishing in minimum wage right now because they're too afraid of giving their craft a go?