The problem isn't that America doesn't need a CTO--as a nation, as a government, it makes more sense to bring systems expertise in-house than to keep bleeding resources out to contractors. There really should be a .gov entity that handles IT and application development.
That said, the problem is that such a position is going to be beset on all sides by people that don't want their job disrupted and which won't be given enough authority to actually change workflows to match the new software.
Really? I think it would have been nice if someone would have told them that healthcare.gov was a giant mess. Of course the CTO has to be competent enough to give good advice.
I seem to recall reading an article about healthcare.gov (maybe the time article) specifically mentioning that the CTO was kept separate from the project until things started to go wrong.
edit: well, it sort of says that, but doesn't offer much explanation:
> Zients, who is not an engineer, was teamed with Park, the White House chief technology officer. "On Oct. 17, I went from White House CTO to full-time HealthCare.gov fixer," Park says. The two were charged, says Zients, with "finding fresh eyes who could decide whether the thing was salvageable."
> ...Early on, Lambrew, highly regarded as a health care policy expert and advocate for medical care for the poor, kept Park off the invitation list for the planning meetings, according to two people who worked on the White House staff prior to the launch. (The White House declined to make Lambrew available for an interview.) The only explanation Park offers for his exclusion is that "The CTO helps set government technology policy but does not get involved in specific programs. The agencies do that."
NYC does have these. Called commuter vans. I know of at least one that I used to take down to Wall Street from the Upper East side. It was great. Fast service and a fraction of the price of a cab.
There are also Taxi shares in NYC, which are similar, but hold less people (4). These are somewhat informal affairs and you have to know where to go / stand. But if you're going downtown anyway, why not split the fare with 4 strangers?
For me it's always been the benefits (medical insurance, bonding, etc) that makes freelancing hard, though maybe that's all changed now with Obamacare.
Do what makes you happy. There's only one go around.
People always say that, but it's not as bad as you think. I'm on my wife's health insurance now, but I could be on my own and it wouldn't be that much off the top. Certainly not the haircut most employers are going to give you in their ludicrous "total compensation package" numbers.
I've never worked at a place that just gave me free health insurance. Early on, it wasn't a lot of money, maybe $30/mo or so, but near the end, it had gotten bad, more like $250/mo. Everyone I know with employer-provided health insurance (with the exception of my wife, who works for the government) has gotten their premiums jacked up on them. So from my perspective it's kind of a fallacy that obtaining your own health insurance as a freelancer is "more expensive" than what you receive as an employee, because what you receive as an employee just ain't that great anymore. In my wife's case, they don't charge her an arm and a leg for health insurance, but they do pay her severally under the market rate for her experience and credentials.
And I definitely go on a lot more vacations now than I ever did before. Most of my "vacation" time before I would spend on being sick, as I never had separate sick leave. Now, because I don't have to go anywhere, if I get a cold, I just work through it.
I'll even accompany my wife on her business trips, work from her hotel room while she is working, and then we can have dinner together in whatever port city she's stuck in that night. I'll go visit my parents on occasion, or friends in other states. I just setup shop during the day in a coffee shop, library, hotel or something and then spend the evenings with them. I still visit with some of my friends about as often as when we lived in the same city together, and depending on the city, I can take the train and work while I'm riding.
Plus, I make a decent amount of interest on the money I put into savings for paying my taxes (being self-employed, I don't have tax withholding, I pay quarterly estimates instead). It's enough I can afford an accountant (well, not that the accountant is that expensive) to file my taxes at the end of the year. For me, it's a significant stress reliever.
And I eat and sleep much better when I'm home and not having to drive back and forth to offices.
In short, not only am I making more, my free cash is still more, and my quality of life is significantly better in every aspect. I don't even really have that high of a consulting rate, as I'm really bad/lazy about marketing myself.
