American government is in the midst of a reputation crisis. An overwhelming majority of citizens—Republicans and Democrats alike—hold negative perceptions of the government and believe it is wasteful, inefficient, and doing a generally poor job managing public programs and providing public services. When social problems arise, Americans are therefore skeptical that the government has the ability to respond effectively. It’s a serious problem, argues Amy E. Lerman, and it will not be a simple one to fix. With Good Enough for Government Work, Lerman uses surveys, experiments, and public opinion data to argue persuasively that the reputation of government is itself an impediment to government’s ability to achieve the common good. In addition to improving its efficiency and effectiveness, government therefore has an equally critical task: countering the belief that the public sector is mired in incompetence. Lerman takes readers through the main challenges. Negative perceptions are highly resistant to change, she shows, because we tend to perceive the world in a way that confirms our negative stereotypes of government—even in the face of new information. Those who hold particularly negative perceptions also begin to “opt out” in favor of private alternatives, such as sending their children to private schools, living in gated communities, and refusing to participate in public health insurance programs. When sufficient numbers of people opt out of public services, the result can be a decline in the objective quality of public provision. In this way, citizens’ beliefs about government can quickly become a self-fulfilling prophecy, with consequences for all. Lerman concludes with practical solutions for how the government might improve its reputation and roll back current efforts to eliminate or privatize even some of the most critical public services.

Recognizing the inherent tensions and contradictions that result from managing people in organizations, Human Resource Management in Public Service: Paradoxes, Processes, and Problems offers provocative and thorough coverage of the complex issues of management in the public sector. Continuing the award-winning tradition of previous editions, this Sixth Edition helps you to understand complex managerial puzzles and explores the stages of the employment process, including recruitment, selection, training, legal rights and responsibilities, compensation, and appraisal. Grounded in real public service experiences, the book emphasizes hands-on skill building and problem solving. New to the Sixth Edition: Ethics case studies have been added to all the chapters, enabling you to learn about a variety of ethical situations that come up in management. Updated and consolidated recruiting strategies offer you a window into the most current methods used in the recruitment process and provide insight into the job seeker’s perspective. New examples from a broad range of local, state, federal, and international settings enable you to apply key concepts to common management issues.

Who’s afraid of for-profit education? Those who work in non-profit or government owned and operated schools. Many parents and other stakeholders have been made fearful by this education establishment. What’s more important to humans: nutrition or education? Nutrition is more important because it is the prerequisite for other human activities, including education. What organizations provide food and who pays for the food? Food is provided by for-profit farmers, for-profit processors, for-profit wholesalers, and for-profit retailers. Most food is purchased with the consumers’ own money, but a significant amount is purchased by low-income individuals using food stamps. Why can’t education be provided similarly using education stamps? We trust for-profit enterprises to provide our food. Why can’t we trust for-profit enterprises to provide K-12 education? Fearmongers have frightened us and made us into gullible compliant socialists who despise commercial activities in education. Go to the supermarket and ponder its marvelous array of foods and then contemplate how a for-profit K-12 education sector would please and amaze its customers.

Through the broad lens of political economy and centred around education reform policy, this essential book provides an in-depth analysis of the current state of American public education and the impact of Covid-19 on calls for change. Drawing upon evidence from nations that routinely outperform America, this text proposes a more holistic approach to accountability and improvement within the American public education system. Chapters explore the issues faced by the current American public education system and proposes potential solutions, including: the role of government as provider of education services; liberty, democracy, and freedom and the ability of parents to control their child’s education; growing frustration with schools, public policies surrounding Covid and other potential crises; and how these concerns will impact the school choice movement. This is an important read for researchers and postgraduate students in education, teachers, parents, public policy makers and appointed government officials who wish to improve the quality of public education. Whether for or against school choice, this book will leave you better informed on current issues of American public education.

The Obama administration will appoint 10 thousand New Federal Appointees outside of the Civil Service. Most of these new appointees, regardless of qualifiecations, will have had very little or no experience in the Federal enviornment with its pecululariies. A Federal veteran has produced a breezy, humerous but serious primer of much of what these appointees will face and how they can avoid the many pitfalles into which so many new appointees fall. For the citizen this is an inside story of how the bureaucracy really operates. President Obama and his cabinet will depend on these appointees to implement their policies and programs and this book explains how they do or do not succeed.