[wdmmg-discuss] Where are the cuts? mini-app

Mon Apr 26 18:58:29 UTC 2010

On Mon, Apr 26, 2010 at 5:49 PM, Rufus Pollock <rufus.pollock at okfn.org> wrote:
> Hi Richard,
>
> Further to our discussion on Saturday here's an outline for the "where
> are the cuts" miniapp. What do you think?
>
> All: On Saturday I talked with Richard and he did a great job of
> emphasizing something we're all aware of (at least those of us in the
> UK!): the biggest discussion of spending is going to take place
> post-election around spending cuts. He suggested specifically that we
> should therefore provide a simple way to record (via crowd-sourcing)
> and display spending cuts.
>
> Estimated cost is 2d (+/- 2d). Do people think this is something we
> should do (I do!)?

This is an excellent idea, and I'd be willing to contribute to it
(after the election) :)


> ## Outline
>
> url: <http://knowledgeforge.net/okfn/tasks/ticket/342
>
> Post election, there will be a lot of discussion of spending cuts.
> There is an opportunity for us to inform the debate. Our aim:
>
>  * Acquire and record information on the cuts. Sources will be
> newspaper articles, etc., sourced from the general public.
>  * Display this information in an easily digestible form.
>  * Ensure this information is widely available by publicising this resource.
>
> == Implementation ==
>
> Would live at wheredoesmymoneygo.org/cuts/ . A little min-app,
> independent of everything else. Re-use key and enumeration value
> tables, but put editable data in separate "cut" table.
>
> Build a web form. Fields:
>
>  - Entity affected: Index by CRA dept, with an "Other" option.
>  - Amount.
>  - Source.
>  - Date entered.
>  - Date Effective.
>  - Function: Top-level COFOG.
>  - Free-form notes.
>
> Qu: what about duplicates? Don't care at first.
>
> Display:
>
>  - Totals by entity and function.
>  - Cuts as percentage of current spending.
>  - Timeline by effective date.
>
> Suggested approach:
>
> We could do this using a Google Form. We could then filter the data by
> hand (e.g. remove duplicates, assign correct departments and
> function). Then we could copy it into our database and republish in
> desired form.
>
> TBD: Frequency of jobs done by hand (i.e. service level).
>
> Estimated time cost: 2d +/- 2
>
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>


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