S/O Best and Worst Federal Agencies

[Anonymous]

Homeland Security is the worst, especially ICE. EVERYTHING is politically motivated; the top managers, since inception (2003) have been awful; mission changes from month to month.

[Anonymous]

NIH is stuck on divisions being top heavy and just employ slave drivers.

[Anonymous]

DoN can be great at certain locations and now I'm with OSD and I love it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think NASA's role will continue to be downgraded. I believe State and USAID have the best work and home balance. DHS is in the middle but they have constant turnover.

I agree with the person who said it depends on division cause my friend works at USAID and she HATES it. She said they are only allowed to telework once every OTHER pay period - WTF is that!

I work for DHS and we telework 3 times a week but other divisions are only allowed 1.

[Anonymous]

EPA. Specifically their Office of Emergency Management. Was supposed to have a third party audit but it looks like a whitewash.

[Anonymous]

I'm an outsider looking in, but everyone I have ever worked with at USTR is outstanding. I have the highest respect for everyone there.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:GAO

GAO is not a federal agency.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:Based on annual surveys, I think NASA is rated best and Homeland Security is down at the bottom.

Yup. And my friends who work for NASA love it. Awesome agency mission, and everyone's proud of it.

And it hasn't done anything of significance in over 35 years. But anyway...

How many robots have YOU put on Mars?

Like I said, nothing of significance. Better to spend the money on eradicating poverty.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Based on annual surveys, I think NASA is rated best and Homeland Security is down at the bottom.

Yup. And my friends who work for NASA love it. Awesome agency mission, and everyone's proud of it.

And it hasn't done anything of significance in over 35 years. But anyway...

We'll I've worked for NASA for 22 years and I disagree with you. Even if you don't care much for the space program, NASA has a fairly large Earth Science component as well. NASA launches the weather satellites that NOAA uses. During hurricanes, typhoons, monsoons, and other major weather conditions, those weather satellites give forewarning so that affected areas can be evacuated, track weather systems and help with the aftermath. During Hurricane Katrina, when the Army Core of Engineers needed to fix the levee breaches in Lake Pontchartrain, they use NASA EOS (Earth Observing Station) satellites to determine where and how large the breaches were (the lake conditions were consider dangerous for divers to go down before they surveyed the conditions). This information was critical to the rebuilding of the levee system. There are still very significant experiments being conducted at the International Space Station.

NASA technology is used everyday in so many aspects of your life and many current products are based off of NASA technology. NASA continues to develop technology that is incorporated into everyday parts of our lives. If you have thin snow-wear like thinsulate or ultra-thin coats, the thin insulating materials used there were originally developed to cut down on the bulk of astronautic space gear. If you have any of the new shoes like Nike Air, etc, then you are using technology that was developed for moon boots. If you wear glasses made of plastics instead of glass, that was originally developed by NASA for conditions like space where you need more durable and more lightweight than glass. If you or your child has had "invisible braces" for your teeth, the material used was developed by NASA. The entire industry of freeze-dried foods are based off of NASA innovations. Current models of radial tires were developed based on techniques used to make extraterrestial lander tires/treads more durable. Temperpedic and memory foam pillows, mattresses are all based on NASA innovations. The anti-rusting costing on many cars is based off of NASA innovations. Many, many innovations from NASA are in use in medicine and health care. For example, if you get many of the modern tests like CAT, full-body scans, etc, a lot of the software innovations that tied the scanning equipment to the computers was developed originally for tying computers to the NASA equipment on space missions. The use of eqiupment like Xray, Ultrasound and CAT scanners was originally performed as NASA. Cochlear implants instead of hearing aids were developed by a NASA scientist. Water filters, solar panels, air filtration systems are all based on developments by NASA engineers trying to solve problems for manned spaceflight. Many of the comforts of daily life as we know it have come from advances that were originally developed at NASA.

I can also attest to the fact that NASA is an excellent place to work. My coworkers and I all agree with the assessment that it is the best place to work in the federal government. Morale here is high and people do not want to leave. I've know many people who have decided to take better offers at other agencies and the vast majority of them come back...some have worked for years to get back and when they do, they are so glad to be back.

OK, those secondary results have marginally improved people's lives. But what about space exploration advances?

[Anonymous]

ED is the worst

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:IRS has had drastic punitive cuts in the last few years.

I agree and there are more to come. But it is a shame since IRS serves a vital role as tax collector. Without someone to collect taxes, gov has no money to spend.

And you could argue it is the oldest agency, after all there were tax collectors at time of Jesus

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:DoN can be great at certain locations and now I'm with OSD and I love it.

I'm with an OSD office and it's pretty bad right now. 1 Director pushed out in 2014. Acting Director pushed out 6 months later. New Acting Director sucks. Morale is so low. Priorities are constantly changing and are not at all in line with what is Congressionally required. So many career civil servants have just said eff it and left.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:GAO

GAO is not a federal agency.

Huh? Then how am I a federal employee??

[Anonymous]

Most people I know (myself included) are pretty happy at State. It usually gets ranked near the top of these lists.

[Anonymous]

HUD is at the bottom and very much deserves to be.