A Matter of Choice

I find it interesting that GSA is asserting that it is the only agency allowed to award Government-Wide Acquisition Contracts (GWACs). In a recent article over at FCW, GSA is battling the National Institute of Health over its GWAC and NASA is worried that they are next in the frying pan.

In this area I must confess that I am sort of a free market kind of guy. I think that others should be allowed to negotiate their contracts. If they negotiate a lower price for some things then the federal government should be able to buy at that lower price. I also think that GSA should not have a monopoly on the negotiations. If GSA is the only game in town, and they have no competition in the GWAC business arena, then I think that it is likely that certain aspects of that service will deteriorate, e.g. quality, timeliness, price. It is price that I am most worried about. As I've mentioned many times before, it is through effective competition that we (the government) achieve competitive pricing. If GSA has no competition, then I worry about competitive pricing on GWAC purchases. If GSA is truly negotiating the best prices then they have nothing to worry about anyway, right?

In the interest of full disclosure, I have been part of a team that has purchased through GSA and their GWACs in the past. I found the service to be better than my expectations. While I received very good service, I still think that there should be competition in this sector. That should continue to foster innovation and GSA, NASA, NIH and others should always be looking for a competitive advantage over the others. That is in the government's best interest, and really the peoples' best interest.