Government Inaction

Over the past week, I've spent entirely too much time at government agencies. There is no better argument for free markets than visiting government agencies.

First up was a trip to the DMV last week. After being in Oregon for several months, I decided it was finally time to retitle our cars and get an Oregon driver's license. Most of my recent DMV experience has been at Utah DMV offices. I used to not understand why Utah had separate offices for registering your car and getting your driver licenses. Now I do. In Utah, even if I waited for the end of a month to register a car, it was a relatively painless process. Not so in Oregon.

You walk in and immediately have to wait in a line. This line is to tell you whether you are eligible for the express line or have to take a number and wait. I had to wait. My number was 95 and they were on 88. Doesn't seem too bad. However, they only had 3 people manning the desks. An hour later, I was finally called. Everything was pretty smooth. Then they informed me that I had to pay $5 to take the written test for the driver's license. This could not be paid with the same check for car registration and a driver's license. Why? Who knows? Of course, I only had one check. Luckily I was able to scrounge $5 cash from the recesses of my wallet. After taking the test, I had to wait again for a desk clerk to tell me I had passed. Then, I had to wait another 10 minutes for them to call me up to the desk to take my picture. Finally, I was done. Just have to wait another 5 days to get my license.

The thing that killed me was the waiting area. The seating was disgusting. And the clientele was somewhat less than what you might call "high-class" I don't think I saw anyone who had showered or shaved in the past 2 days. Finally, I just decided to stand while I waited.

As bad as my DMV experience was, it pales in comparison to my recent experiences with the Postal Service. We moved to a new apartment recently. Because it is a brand-new apartment, there were no keys to the mailbox yet. We were told we needed to go to the post office and claim the keys. There's the rub. We tried to go on a Saturday and were instructed that the office for claiming keys was only open Monday through Friday from 9:30 to 3:30. Government hours baffle me. By my calculation, that's 30 hours per week.

So I returned on a Monday at 3:15. As I arrived, I went to the office and it was locked. There was a sign on the door saying "we will be closing early today." So, let me get this straight. They can only be bothered to work 30 hours a week, and then can't even work the whole 30? So, I went again the next day on my lunch break. All I can say is I'm glad I'm on salary. We waited almost 45 minutes to see the person who spent 30 seconds to give us the key. See, the brilliant powers that be at the Medford Post Office decided to have the passport office in charge of giving out mail keys. So, we had to wait for 2 people filling out extensive passport applications. It literally took her 30 seconds to get our key. Why can't they have the main counter clerks do it? It involved her looking through a bin for our address and handing us an envelope. Does that require special training?

Also shocking to me was that in the cramped passport office, there were two desks being manned, or in this case womanned, by one cranky woman. On the two desks there were a total of 0 computers. Isn't this the 21st century? How can they not have computers? Wouldn't it be infinitely more productive to have someone type up silly passport documents and express mailing labels?

So anyways, I spent a total of 3 hours or so at the various government agencies. Not my idea of fun. But at least I'm done. Until I get the title of our recently paid-off other car. Then I get to go back for another hour or two.