In early June, the Trump administration announced the federal government would stop preparing for the Y2K bug, a computing glitch that would prevent computers from processing the date correctly at the turn of the millennium.
Y2K was over 17 years ago. Not much really happened.
Throughout those 17 years, federal agencies were required to comply with seven paperwork requirements that would allow the government to respond in the case of IT disruptions related to the year 2000.
It's unknown how much time was being spent on Y2K preparations, but Linda Springer, an OMB senior adviser, told Bloomberg that the requirements were already usually ignored in practice.
Regarding the shift in policy, which was among 43 other eliminated requirements, the Office of Management and Budget Director Mick Mulvaney told reporters, “We’re looking for stuff everyone agrees is a complete waste of time.”
In the spirit of cutting back ridiculous government policies, here are three other outdated practices.
Physical Copies Of Copyright Submissions
If someone or a company wishes to copyright any form of media — including TV, film, photographs, musical compositions, audio recordings and books — it must be submitted to the U.S. Copyright Office as a physical copy.
While the registration process for a work can often be completed online, “Section 407 of the Copyright Act subjects all works published in the United States to a mandatory deposit requirement” which consists of two hard copies of the work in its “best version,” according to the Copyright Office.
Failure to submit the physical copies within three months can result in a fine.
That said, any work that is available exclusively online is exempt from this requirement.
It's unclear if there is a modern rationale for the rule, and the Copyright Office wasn't available to provide insight.
Minting Pennies
Pennies have become a near-useless form of currency. While necessary for exact change, carrying enough of them to have any real ability to purchase goods is inconvenient — most vending machines don't even accept the coin.
Each penny costs significantly more than a penny to produce. In 2016, the price of minting one penny was 1.5 cents.
In 2015, the cost was 1.43 cents per penny and about 9.37 billion were produced, totaling just under $134 million.
That translated to a loss of about $40.3 million from the production of a coin that is rarely spent.
The main reasons to keep the penny around center on public sentiment and charitable donations but it wouldn’t be the first coin retired by the U.S. The half-cent went out of production in 1857, even though in today’s money it would be valued at $0.14.