Joe Davidson: Before shrinking size of government, start with correct question

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What is the right size of the federal workforce?

The subject of a congressional hearing, “Rightsizing the Federal Workforce,” implies the current one isn’t right.

Maybe it isn’t, but how do we know?

As with many proposals to cut the number of federal employees, the thrust of the House federal workforce subcommittee hearing was on reducing staff with little discussion on how that would affect taxpayers.

The real question is more fundamental and difficult: What is the role of the federal government?

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As told by Rep. Dennis A. Ross (R-Fla.), the chairman: “The size of the federal workforce now stands at over 2.1 million — the largest federal workforce in modern history.”

Not so, according to Office of Personnel Management data.

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