Veterans Affairs Pros And Cons

“Good enough for government work,” a phrase colloquially used by those employed by the United States government to describe the low level of standards in the federal government. In the current climate of public distrust of the government, the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) and its unions serves as a pinnacle of the failures of accountability and transparency.
The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) serves a vital purpose in the government in caring for America’s Soldiers, Marines, Sailors, and Airmen. The mission statement of the VA is, “To fulfill President Lincoln’s promise ‘to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow, and his orphan’ by serving and honoring the men and women who are America’s Veterans” (Department of Veterans Affairs, 2015). The VA provides a multitude of services to America’s veterans, the largest of which being medical treatments.
The VA is the largest single source of medical care in the United States. According to Daniell Kurtzleben (2010) at U.S. News, the VA employed 308,814 workers in 2010, and was the second largest federal agency behind the Department of Defense. The veteran population totaled 21,269,039 in FY16, of those,

there were a total of 6,015,944 unique patients to the VA (Department of Veterans Affairs, 2017). This averages to nearly 16,500 veterans seeking medical care daily. Medical care is just one of many services that the VA provides to veterans; however, it is by far the largest. Total expenditure for FY16 was $173,685,850, with $84 million going towards compensation & pensions and $63 million towards medical care (Department of Veterans Affairs, 2017). The remaining $30 million went towards other expenditures such as education, loans, and general operating expenses (Department of Veterans Affairs, 2017).
Corruption among public servants exists for numerous reasons. One theory to his is the relative deprivation theory, which states, “that people feel deprived when, in social comparisons, they perceive a failure to obtain the same outcome as other” (Gong & Wu, 2012, p. 194). Employees who do not earn as much salary nor have the same benefits as their counterparts may feel a lower sense of worth. A similar amount of work is put forth; however, a dissimilar outcome is provided. This may occasionally lead to elements of corruption.
There are two theories that explain further explain why some individuals are more susceptible to corruption than others.

Gong & Wu (2012), continue by stating that corruption can be broken down into need-based and greed-based. Need-based refers to a necessity of basic items such as food and water in order to survive. Greed-based refers to cases in which well-off individuals partake in corruption in order to further their own personal wealth or standing (p. 194). Workers involving themselves in need-based corruption do so out of necessity. Their current salary does not provide a living wage. These workers are forced to steal, bribe, and embezzle in order to survive. Workers undertaking greed-base corruption serve to further their already comfortable, and often lavish

lifestyles.
These two forms of greed are vastly different and require separate solutions in order to combat it. Elimination of greed-based requires a complex solution in order to get at the root of why people act unethically. It necessitates a more individualized approach requiring a more effective method of screening out those displaying undesired traits. Additionally, the threat of severe punishments such as decades in prison seemingly provide little discouragement towards those that would cheat others. This can be seen in the high profile cases such as Bernie Madoff and the Enron scandal. Due to the complexity of this, the solution to eliminate need-based corruption would ostensibly be simpler and more cost effective for governments.