How Government Fights Over Petty Cash Hide Bigger Waste

The Fiscal Policy Podcast with Fexingo: Government Budgets, Stimulus, and Public Spending · Aug 22, 2026 · 9m · transcript

Every year, federal agencies spend billions on small purchases—office supplies, travel, IT gadgets—that slip through the cracks because they fall below the micro-purchase threshold. But the real waste isn't the $10 stapler; it's the system that lets agencies avoid competitive bidding altogether. In this episode, Lucas and Luna dig into a little-known rule called the 'micro-purchase exception' and how it lets agencies split big contracts into tiny pieces to dodge oversight. They walk through a real case from the Department of Defense, where a $2,000 purchase order process…