Defense beat

hy can't Ben Cohen stick to ice cream? It was bad enough when he filled the world with Cherry Garcia and Rain Forest Crunch, ending all possibility of a successful diet. Now he wants to eliminate my job.

The "Ben" of Ben & Jerry's has left the creamery to take on the Defense Department. With several high-profile associates he founded Business Leaders for Sensible Priorities. The group's goal is to trim another 15 percent, or about $40 billion, from the Defense budget. Lawrence Korb, former assistant secretary of Defense, supports this goal in a recent report and contributes his analysis that further cuts will not harm readiness or U.S. military dominance. Cohen's group has a sophisticated Web site (www.businessleaders.org) and a bus painted stem-to-stern in huge green dollar signs. It will travel the country delivering "informative and fun presentations on budget priorities." When it pulls into town, residents can play the "U Slice the Pie" game and decide how they would reallocate money now going to Defense. The bus left Washington for a national tour on April 15 (get it?).

Cohen and friends are just one more reason I'm polishing my resume. He wants to divert money from Defense to domestic needs, such as schools and health care for the uninsured. Other warnings come from stalwart friends of DoD who want to cut infrastructure and use the funds to modernize weapons. Both sides are looking for "safe" savings in Defense. My agency, the Defense Finance and Accounting Service, is among that select group always found at the top of the list. Moderates want to reduce DFAS about 50 percent; others want to outsource the whole shebang.

Precarious existence is no hindrance to success. DFAS is the epitome of streamlining and process improvement. When formed in 1991, DFAS inherited 324 disparate finance and accounting systems; today there are fewer than 98 and the goal is no more than 31 systems by 2003. Likewise, the agency inherited 338 finance and accounting activities; through consolidation and integration, that number has been reduced to five centers and 20 operating locations.

People reductions have been equally impressive. In the months before DFAS was created, more than 40,000 people were employed in DoD finance and accounting. In 1992, DFAS had 31,000 personnel; today the number is 18,000 and shrinking. The agency has done a fine job of using attrition to avoid reductions in force. But as pressure mounts, I figure my DFAS days are numbered.

Despite this amazing disappearing act, the work continues to flow. In a typical month DFAS processes 9.8 million payments to personnel and 1.2 million payments to vendors; it processes 450,000 travel vouchers, 122,000 transportation bills, and 500,000 savings bonds. In 1999, DFAS won the Gartner Group award for effective use of measurement and efficient use of information technology to enable business strategy-the only government agency so recognized.

Such impressive performance might buy security in other climes, but avails little when both friends and critics of DoD are looking for cash. The man who became DFAS director in May 1999 knows he can't promise his workforce employment. So he made the only offer available to humane, enlightened leaders in the information age: He promised employability. All DFAS "associates" should have access to career guides, self-study materials, and computer-based training so they can improve their skills and compete for jobs in or outside DFAS.

This employability pact, embraced by the most progressive companies, is the best deal available in today's economy. It's based on faith that "If you train them, good jobs will come."

Some associates will find good jobs outside DFAS. But many will disappear into the broad working class and settle for reduced pay and benefits. Salaries for accounting technicians at my DFAS center start at $25,857. In the private sector, median pay for accounting and auditing clerks is $23,190. Of course, that's for full-time work; according to the Labor Department, one-third of all accounting clerks work part time. The Labor Department's definition of "accounting clerk" is broad and includes those who, like DFAS associates, perform complex reconciliation tasks using computers. The department projects total employment of accounting and auditing clerks will decline through 2008, for the same reason these jobs are declining at DFAS. Many of my co-workers, whose fragile claim on middle-class life comes from a government job, will not benefit from getting better at what they do.

I have a new project for Ben Cohen. Maybe he could figure out why over half of America is working harder but losing ground. As my neighbor says, "I believe the economy created a zillion new jobs last year. My wife and I have five of them."

Wealth expands at the top of the ladder while upward mobility declines. More jobs are created and more workers displaced. Displaced workers who find new jobs take an average pay cut of 13 percent, according to L. Mishel, J. Bernstein, and J. Schmitt, authors of The State of Working America 1998-1999 (ILR/Cornell University Press, 1999); more than 28 percent who had health coverage with their old jobs do not have it with the new. This is called the "blue-collarization of white-collar work life." I expect to learn much more about it after leaving DFAS.

Larita J. Killian is a financial management specialist in Columbus, Ohio. These views are strictly her own and do not reflect the views or policy of DFAS, DoD, or the federal government.